ths 
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7 
meat zee rriet” 











Division 


LUDUT Zi Zot P34 P34 7924 | 
Palmer, George Herbert, 184 
-1933. 
The life of Alice Freeman 
Palmer 





Gp George h. Palmer 


PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY 


THE ODYSSEY OF HOMER, Books I-XII. The Text 
and an English Prose Version, 


THE ODYSSEY. Complete. An English Translation 
in Prose. 

THE ANTIGONE OF SOPHOCLES. Translated into 
English. With an Introduction. 

THE TEIEE DORE THics: 

THE NATURE OF GOODNESS. 

THE PROBLEM OF FREEDOM. 

THE ENGLISH WORKS OF GEORGE HERBERT, 


3, volumes. Newly arranged and annotated, and con- 
sidered in relation to his life, by G. H. PALMER. 


THE ENGLISH POEMS OF GEORGE HERBERT. 
Edited by Gzorcg H. Patmrr. 

INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY IN THE SONNETS 
OF SHAKESPEARE, 

FORMATIVE TYPES IN ENGLISH POETRY. 

THE LIFE OF ALICE FREEMAN PALMER. 

THE TEACHER, AND OTHER ESSAYS AND AD. 


DRESSES ON EDUCATION. By Grorcr H. PALMER 
and ALIcE FREEMAN PALMER, 


A MARRIAGE CYCLE. By Atrict Freeman PALMER. 
Edited by Gzorce H. PALmgr. 


A SERVICE IN MEMORY OF ALICE FREEMAN 
PALMER. Edited by Ggorcze H. PALMER. 


SELF-CULTIVATION IN ENGLISH. Riverside Edu- 
cational Monographs. 

THE !IOEAL TEACHER. Riverside Educational Mono- 
graphs, 

ETHICAL ANDO MORAL INSTRUCTION IN THE 
SCHOOLS. Riverside Educational Monographs. 


TRADES AND PROFESSIONS. Riverside Educational 
Monographs. 


HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
Boston New York Cuicaco San FRANCISCO 





ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 





Portrait in 1892 


Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2022 with funding from 
Princeton Theological Seminary Library 


httops://archive.org/details/lifeofalicefreemOOpalm_0O 


JO TRY e 


J f- 
a 


——— 
4 : : x 
‘ ; ‘ 


MAR 12 1999 
THE LIFE OF rm 


ALICE FREEMAN PALMER ~~“ 


BY ’ 
GEORGE HERBERT PALMER 


NEW EDITION WITH APPENDIX 





BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
The Riverside Press Cambridge 


COPYRIGHT, 1908 AND 1924, BY GEORGE HERBERT PALMER 


ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 


Published April 1908 


FIFTIY-FIFTH THOUSAND 


The Riverside Press 
CAMBRIDGE - MASSACHUSETTS 
PRINTED IN THE U.S.A. 


CONTENTS 


TJ INTRODUCTION. is 6 ee ae 
PIP HILGHOOD Fcieiie ie eile viene 
TAP GIRLHOOD te) ete 65's 

EV OOE CHE UNIVERSITY) iaiive: ia!) sve dbs 
VY. ScHoot-TEACHING . , .. « - 
VI. Treacutne at WELLESLEY ... 


VII. Tuer WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY. . 


VIII. Tre Wetiestey Presipency (Continued) 


LO eVLARRIAGH ie? le aie linet esi ieriie).'e 


mK) SABBATICAL EARS c) Ws, e. ve ve. ve 


PMC AMBRIDGE Ais aed feito ieitikeuive sie 


XII. Camsringe (Continued) . . + » 


TTP BOS EORD ec kiiteitiien) stiteuielivs 


PT VPI EATON Oe icayialie teiiie ib viei iis 


MVE CHARACTER Hip lis lielilelhieite ele 


DP xirrss ye eit eds ose lien te 
APPENDIX 
I. Tue Story or tHE StuM GIRL . 


il, Tae Har. or Fame)... 6). 


118 
135 
168 
189 
220 
243 
Q77 
311 
828 
353 


357 
362 


i 


RC ii 
mie 
Wie . 





ILLUSTRATIONS 


ALICE FREEMAN PatMER .. . . . . Frontispiece 


PORTRATTOAT FIVESVEARS (0). 5 eens 2 2G 


(DHM SUSQUEHANNA VALLEY... os) ctv emeniareoe 


MisgniGAN UNIVERSITY) (co. bie ie’ 6b) a) eee ae 
WV ET UESEEY s COLLEGE ever real) cue oe, aki ret eainenee DO 
ACATIEMICFLORTRAITUN srr pey ck ne eh et aur oite ate Loe 


Tue WELLESLEY CotteEGE MremortaL . ... . 166 
CAMBRIDGHOMLOUBIG tc iefl site) tren! oii eel ei at gu bya neeO 
Cex MEHI DUR LE RA RSM si silt 6 tie l-e ii os) 6),\e si eteny eee ae 
DOs UOR EMO USE tau cll sail siilicsletd sli iain sisdl ork etOe 


TGASTMLORTRAIT era at el vet eit elie it otts 2 « » 328 


; ’ 


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a uN ? p 

oul ne fan 7 

si Na a NT ‘Va 

’ y Pes! ‘ a 
i 

“PRE RES: 
bla 

Ce 


{tra Ke ii ii ta 
: Pia ‘nae 





ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


When fell, to-day, the word that she had gone, 

Not this my thought: Here a bright journey ends, 

Here rests a soul unresting; here, at last, 

Here ends that earnest strength, that generous life — 

For all her life was giving. Rather this 

I said (after the first swift, sorrowing pang): 

Radiant with love,and love’s unending power, 

Hence, on a new quest, starts an eager spirit — 

No dread, no doubt, unhesitating forth 

With asking eyes; pure as the bodiless souls 

Whom poets vision near the central throne 

Angelically ministrant to man; 

So fares she forth with smiling, Godward face; 

Nor should we grieve, but give eternal thanks — 

Save that we mortal are, and needs must mourn. 
RicHarp WaTsoN GILDER. 


December 6, 1902. 






| ‘ i i } ; i bas 
oF nian: ch fi a wih ai Thee 
















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* } i uth) T 4 niin Wey ae ee ‘} he iy) sie 1 , ile iy' a 
yy tS, A ee Nahe rt ui wil a 
- eae te ce » yal i 4 | Ay nee, 
ye he eee te J ne ae ay aw aa Aly Ai 9 
ti) : Lea a EY) ath t At rs 
eee alae Bie ana bubs i ro read Nip he ae 
d+ ; he ; ha 
’ i | EM Ak 
tea p 
f 


THE LIFE OF 
ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I 


INTRODUCTION 


THREE reasons impel me to write this book, affec- 
tion first of all. Mrs. Palmer was my wife, deeply 
beloved and honored. Whatever perpetuates that 
honor brings me peace. To leave the dead wholly 
dead is rude. Vivid creature that she was, she must 
_ not lie forgotten. Something of her may surely be 
saved if only I have skill. Perhaps my grateful pen 
may bring to others a portion of the bounty I my- 
self received. 

A second and more obvious summons comes from 
the fact that in herself and apart from me Mrs. 
Palmer was a notable person. Somebody therefore 
may be tempted to write her life if I do not; for her 
friends were numbered by the ten thousand. At 
her death I received nearly two thousand letters 
from statesmen, schoolgirls, clerks, lawyers, teachers, 
country wives, outcasts, millionaires, ministers, men 


z ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


of letters, — a heterogeneous and to me largely an 
unknown company, but alike in feeling the marvel 
of her personality and the loss her death had caused 
them. Few women of her time, I have come to 
think, were more widely loved. And now these 
persons are recalling her influence and asking for 
explanation. Where lay that strange power, and how 
did she obtain it? She lived no longer than most 
of us. She had no early advantage of birth, physical 
vigor, or station. Half her years were passed in com- 
parative poverty. During only nine did she hold 
positions which could be called conspicuous. She 
wrote little. In no field of scholarship was she emi- 
nent. Her tastes were domestic, her voice gentle, 
her disposition feminine and self-effacing. Yet by 
personal power rather than by favoring circumstance 
this woman sent out an influence from the Atlantic 
to the Pacific, an influence unique in kind and puz- 
zling those on whom it fell. In her appearance there 
was nothing enigmatic. Altogether simple she seemed, 
approachable, playful even, interested in common 
things, in common people, with no air of profundity, 
and small inclination to remake after her own pat- 
tern the characters of those who came near; but any 
one on whom she turned her great eyes went out 
from her presence renewed. Hope revived, one’s 
special powers were heightened ; the wise, the exalted 
course became suddenly easy; while toil and difli- 


INTRODUCTION 3 


culties began to spice the life they had previously 
soured. In all this there was something mysterious 
which I am solicited to explain. 

I cannot explain it. Probably genius is never 
explicable. The more nearly it is examined, the more 
intricately marvelous it appears. Fifteen years of 
closest companionship with Mrs. Palmer did not dis- 
close to me the pulse of that curious machine. She 
always remained a surprise. Yet I never tired of 
studying her; for though we seldom can fully com- 
prehend a person, in studying one who is great we 
can push analysis farther than elsewhere and with 
larger entertainment and profit; we discover a multi- 
tude of ingredients unsuspected at first; and, most 
interesting of all, we come upon strange modes of 
turning trivial things to power and of gaily discard- 
ing what men usually count important. And even 
when at last we arrive at what defies analysis, being 
the very individuality itself, its beautiful mystery still 
lures us on and — like Keats’s Grecian Urn — en- 
largingly “teases us out of thought.” 

Accordingly, in response to many requests, I mean 
to make the second object of this book the study of 
an attractive human problem, even though by doing 
so I prove to how limited an extent the demand 
for an understanding can be gratified. I certainly 
shall never succeed in accounting for Mrs. Palmer’s 
charm; I fear I shall not even reproduce it. In her 


4 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


lifetime many artists tried to depict that haunting 
and variable face, but without success. The sun 
itself gave only partial and contradictory reports. 
So I must fail in setting forth so elusive a being. But 
this failure will restrain less familiar hands; and I 
can at least set in order the chief facts of her life 
and select characteristic specimens of her sayings 
and writings. 

And if so much is accomplished, perhaps I may 
accomplish something more. In life Mrs. Palmer’s 
personality was an influential one. It embodied 
stimulating ideals. ‘Those who approached her, even 
casually, gained power and peace. President Tucker 
says, “ There is no other of our generation, with the 
possible exception of Phillips Brooks, who has stood 
to such a degree for those qualities in which we must 
all believe with unquenchable faith if we are to do 
anything in this world.” And President Eliot, “'To 
my mind this career is unmatched by that of any 
other American woman. Mrs. Palmer’s life and 
labors are the best example thus far set before 
American womanhood.” If my portrait of her, then, 
is correct, invigoration will go forth from it and dis- 
heartened souls be cheered; for after all, her modes 
of life — with suitable adaptation to alien tempera- 
ments — are capable of pretty wide application. 
What was peculiar in her was small. She chiefly 
distinguished herself by wise ways of confronting 


INTRODUCTION 6 


the usual world. While, then, I try to restore her to 
life for the benefit of those who did and did not know 
her, I may hope that readers will find in the disclos- 
ure of her methods material for their own strength 
and courage. 

One more aim remains, weighty, yet lying on the 
‘surface. In some of the social movements of her 
time Mrs. Palmer had a considerable share. During 
her life education was undergoing reconstruction, 
new colleges were coming into existence, fresh op- 
portunities and capacities for women were being 
claimed and tested. It is well to follow such move- 
ments in the lives of their leaders and to understand 
the situation in which those leaders found them- 
‘selves. By sharing in their early hopes, difficulties, 
and results, we comprehend better the world we in- 
habit. As Mrs. Palmer was sometimes forced into 
such leadership, she may be said to have a certain 
historical importance. 

Such, then, are the three impulses of this book, — 
the insatiability of love, the gencral desire for por- 
traiture, the rights of history. Here personal, psy- 
chological, social motives mingle. Since I can no 
longer talk with her, I would talk of her and get the 
comfort of believing that even now without me she 
may not be altogether perfect. Enjoying, too, artis- 
tic criticism, psychology, ethical problems, I gladly 
bring my special knowledge to bear on what many 


6 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


found mysterious, pleasing myself with thinking that 
in making her known to old friends and new I shall 
also make them better known to themselves. And 
then, retaining my belief in the public causes for 
which she stood, I should like briefly to record their 
history and thus encourage the next generation in 
its own way to push them on. But in carrying out 
these collective aims I encounter obstacles which 
rigidly limit my success. 

Mrs. Palmer was a person of strong temperamental 
reserve. One did not at first suspect it. She seemed 
uncommonly open; and so indeed she was — open 
for going forth to others, but not for admitting them 
to her. Her simple manners and generous sympathies 
put every one at ease and gave each the satisfaction, 
entirely well-grounded, of feeling that he was for the 
moment her greatest object of regard. But when one 
turned about and tried to make her the object of 
regard, one did not penetrate far. Not that she had 
the distrustful modesty which fears to talk of its 
doings. She knew her powers, respected them, and 
had a good deal of the child’s way of finding herself 
as interesting as did others. Nor did she, like an 
aristocrat, seek to screen herself from the common 
gaze. But accustomed as she was to ministering 
and not being ministered unto, the loving scrutiny 
which most were eager to bestow she took, as it were, 
merely in passing. Nothing was easier than a super- 


INTRODUCTION 7 


ficial acquaintance with her; but friends have told me 
that after an acquaintance of five years, while admir- 
ing devotion steadily grew, they knew her no better 
than on the first day. ‘The springs of her conduct, 
what she cared for most, her ultimate beliefs and alle- 
giances, few could know — perhaps not even herself. 

Xt is difficult to penetrate far into a nature so con- 
crete and unconscious, a nature, too, which held itself 
aloof from others by perpetual kindness. To depict 
it I might seem obliged to adopt an objective method 
and to allow the facts of the life to speak for them- 
selves. But such a method would be useless; the life 
was uneventful. Hers was in general a smooth. 
existence, in which little happened which might not 
befall any of us. I have often thought that God, 
Nature, Fate, or whoever the presiding power may 
be, foreseeing her desire always to find her happiness 
in that of others, provided her abundantly out of the 
common lot and left the element of distinction to 
be added by herself. It was always she who ennobled 
her circumstance. The occurrences of her life were 
few and unimportant, while what she drew from them 
fashioned a powerful personality. On herself, then, 
I must concentrate attention and try to induce my 
readers to look rather through the facts than at them. 
Of exciting narrative I have not much to offer. My 
book will be a kind of character novel, in which 
little occurs and nobody appears except the heroine, 


8 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


And since I am detailing difficulties, let me say 
that my material is not quite what I should wish. 
I knew Mrs. Palmer during little more than a third 
of her life, when the formative influences of child- 
hood and early womanhood were already absorbed 
into structure. My knowledge of these I piece to- 
gether from what can be gathered from the few 
survivors of those early years and from incidental, 
remarks of her own. But she was never reminiscent. 
or introspective, had little interest in tracing her 
growth, and at any time took herself pretty much as. 
she found herself. I once induced her to set down. 
the principal dates of her life, and these notes now 
furnish the trusty framework of my tale. But as I. 
am trying to construct an inner history rather than’ 
an outer, such a record goes only a little way. What 
{ want is sayings and writings, so that my readers. 
may catch her quality from her own lips; and these 
I lack in the midst of peculiar abundance. Let both. 
that abundance and that lack reveal her character. 

While she wrote no books and published only half 
a dozen articles, during each of her later years she 
made no less than twenty speeches. I at first thought 
I might exhibit her in extracts from these and from 
her letters. But each source I find to be only slenderly 
available. Her addresses were never written. In- 
deed, she seldom drew up memoranda of the points. 
to be discussed. Her rapid speech confounded the: 


INTRODUCTION ing 


reporters, so that in only a few instances have I reports 
which are anything like verbatim. Little, therefore, 
of her literary output remains, except what lodged 
in the minds of the hearers. There was in her a 
wastefulness like that of the blossoming tree. It 
sometimes disturbed me, and for it I occasionally 
took her to task. “ Why will you,” I said, “give all 
this time to speaking before uninstructed audiences, 
to discussions in endless committees with people too 
dull to know whether they are talking to the point, 
and to anxious interviews with tired and tiresome 
women? You would exhaust yourself less in writing 
books of lasting consequence. At present you are 
building no monument. When you are gone people 
will ask who you were, and nobody will be able to 
say.” But I always received the same indifferent 
answer: “Well, why should they say? I am trying 
to make girls wiser and happier. Books don’t help 
much toward that. They are entertaining enough, 
but really dead things. Why should I make more of 
them? It is people that count. You want to put 
yourself into people; they touch other people; these, 
others still, and so you go on working forever.” I 
could never stir her interest in posthumous fame nor 
shake her estimate of the importance of dealing with 
individual human beings. Instinctively she adopted 
the idea of Jesus that if you would remould the 
world, the wise way is not to write, but to devote 


10 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


your fleeting years to persistent talks with a dozen 
young fishermen. And that this audacious method 
was effective in her small degree, as in that majestic 
instance, I now daily perceive as I meet with those 
who once were almost dead and were brought to 
living fruitfulness by her ardent patience. Yet still 
I mourn that through behaving so generously she 
largely disappeared. 

It might seem that her letters would save her. 
They went forth by the hundred a week. They were 
usually written by her own hand, were long, careful, 
and highly personal, even when relating to business 
affairs. In them she expressed her best qualities. 
Whoever received one knew that it was a thing of 
value. In these, then, would naturally be found the 
material for her biography. 

But the trait which I have just mentioned limits 
their use. She was unceasingly and minutely per- 
sonal. The individual human being was in her 
world the all-important thing; and when she wrote 
him, every sentence concerned just him and no one 
else. This made her letters not merely unsuitable to 
print, but for the general reader unintelligible and 
for the most part uninteresting. She entered into her 
correspondent’s circumstances with such specific de- 
tail as to bewilder any one who knew them less than 
she and he. To explain the allusions would require 
a letter longer than her own. His family ties, his 


INTRODUCTION 1] 


business perplexities, his previous falls or rises, the 
wisest steps by which he may now reach his ends, the 
assurance that some one cares for his success and is 
elated over his little advancements — these are the 
matters of which she hourly wrote. Her eager simple 
language awoke his confidence and gratitude, but a 
different person would find her pages as empty as the 
newspaper of a neighboring town. Rarely do her 
letters contain general truths, discussions of public 
questions, opinions on books or persons, rarely do 
they relate to interests of her own. She has no inter- 
ests which are not those of him to whom she writes. 
Even her occasional descriptions, like those sent 
home during her residences abroad, animated though 
they are and skilful in seizing the distinctive features 
of unaccustomed scenes, seem written because the 
reader needs to hear rather than she to speak. The 
notion of giving to somebody was a necessary factor 
in all she did and said. The artist craves expression 
primarily for delivering his own soul; knowing too 
that if he accomplishes this, he fixes public attention 
on his product. Her abounding soul sought neither 
that relief nor that approval, but found its full de- 
light in relieving the souls of others. 

Only once, so far as I know, did she turn to ex- 
pression for her own sake. After her death I came 
upon a book of verses, written by her during the last 
five years of her life. She had given it the title of 


12 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


“A Marriage Cycle,” and in it had endeavored to 
mark the successive steps through which love brings 
a pair into union with each other, with nature, and 
with God. Marriage she had always reverenced, 
holding that only through it can either man or wo- 
man reach the largest fulfilment. When, compara- 
tively late in life, she came to her own, she began in 
her usual fashion to bring out its inner significance 
and beauty. Romance was in her case no product of 
novelty, but was usually fertilized and rendered more 
exuberant by the deposits of time. Accordingly, when 
ten years of marriage and her own fortieth year were 
passed, wonder and gratitude over her happy con- 
dition became almost oppressive. From occasional 
dates scattered through this book of verses I judge 
she now began to snatch brief intervals from busi- 
ness and employ them for recording typical situa- 
tions of crisis and growth in our life together. She 
had never written poetry before, though ever a stu- 
dent of it. Now she wrote purely for herself, rarely 
showing me anything. ‘This book, more than any 
document that has survived her, depicts her heart, 
mind, courage, and character. For this reason I 
cannot use it. Its poetry is too intimate to be pub- 
lished during my life. Only a few pieces, expressing 
chiefly religious trust, I printed in a magazine 
shortly after her death. A few more, relating to coun- 
try scenes, are given here in my thirteenth chapter. 


INTRODUCTION | 13 


Such then are my resources, my difficulties, and 
my aims. I move within restricted bounds. On ace 
count of an extremely individual quality, not much 
of Mrs. Palmer’s poetry or correspondence can be 
used to illustrate her life. Still less is available of 
that which made her most widely known, her public 
speeches. The events of her life were not unusual, 
while her personality was baffling, sheltered as it: 
was by instinctive reserve and too large to be easily 
measured. Yet such difficulties do not block the 
way; they merely define it. While rendering any-: 
thing like the usual ‘‘Life and Letters” impossible, 
they point directly to something not less interesting, 
and perhaps of equal value: to an impressionistic 
portrait, a personal estimate, an evolutional study... 
For in calling her life uneventful I do not mean that 
it lacked interest. Every week was full of it, for her- 
self and for others. To a discerning eye wealth of 
incident offers no such interest as an even unfolding 
brings, where event links with event, each later dis- 
closing what was contained in germ in some earlier, 
until when, in orderly sequence, something is reached 
which under other circumstances might be aston- 
ishing, it comes prepared for and as only a matter 
of happy course. These are the truly dramatic lives, 
and such was preéminently hers. We follow here 
a harmoniously developed and stimulating drama, 
into which little that is accidental intrudes. To say : 


14 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


that Mrs. Palmer was born in an obscure border 
village and became the renowned president of an 
zastern college at twenty-six may at first startle, 
but only until acquaintance with her shows how nat- 
urally this eminence and obscurity went together. In 
some degree to bring about that acquaintance and to 
set forth the orderly development of a noble nature 
is my inviting task. 

And for an undertaking thus limited the material 
is not insufficient. There are my seventeen years of 
acquaintance, the recollections of those who were 
with her in early years, the talk of hundreds of stu- 
dents, the records of colleges and societies, the en- 
thusiastic affection which everywhere attended her, 
and the marks of her influence still discernible in 
a multitude of lives. I have already mentioned the 
set of dates which she herself drew up. And then 
her letters, though on the whole of small historical 
value, contain precious illustrations of character. 
Everywhere they bear marks of her ardor, ease, sym- 
pathy, and elevation. ‘They show, too, the growth 
of her powers. I use them often, therefore, but 
always with the aim of exhibiting herself, and not 
events or persons. For this reason no one of them 
is printed entire, no dates are affixed, nor names of 
those to whom they were written. Careless of the 
original text, I merely gather groups of characteris- 
tic fragments, sometimes even piecing together two 


INTRODUCTION 15 


which happen to be marked with a similar mocd of 
mind. 

My general plan will be to devote a single chapter 
to each definable section of her career; in it to ana- 
lyze the forces which were then shaping her growth, 
and at its close, through these fragmentary letters 
or those of friends, to give an independent report 
of how she looked and spoke at the time. In this 
way I believe my scanty materials will yield their 
utmost. Possibly, too, the course of her develop- 
ment will be followed more readily if I mark out in 
it four unequal periods and give them special names. 
The first we may call her Family Life, extending 
up to her entering Windsor Academy in 1865; the 
second, the Expansion of her Powers, up to her 
graduation from Michigan University in 1876; the 
third, her Service of Others, up to her marriage 
in 1887; and last the Expression of Herself, up to 
her death in 1902. While these periods are not ex- 
clusive of one another, each is dominated by special 
interests which pretty clearly distinguish it, the later 
ones being hardly possible without those which go 
before. But Mrs. Palmer herself was unaware of 
any such divisions of her life; and if the reader 
chooses to forget them or to count them pedantic, I 
shall not think him disrespectful to me or to her. 

In reference to one feature of my book a little 
warning may be well. This is a prejudiced story, 


16 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I am far from a dispassionate, or even a detached 
observer of her whom I would make known. She 
and I had become pretty completely one. Often my 
only way of telling about her is to tell about myself. 
The book, therefore, while ostensibly a biography, 
claims many privileges of an autobiography, and 
might properly enough be called the autobiography 
of a friend. In it I must be allowed abundant ego- 
‘tism, reminiscence, admiration, personal disclosure. 
But perhaps such a compound method will not be 
thought inappropriate in a portrait of one whiose 
constant habit it was to mingle her abounding life 
with that of others. 


II 


CHILDHOOD 


Auice ELviraA FREEMAN was born on the night of 
February 21, 1855, at Colesville, Broome County, 
New York. The influences which chiefly shaped her 
childhood were her country life, her narrow means, 
and her father’s change of occupation. All else is 
subordinate to these. 

Colesville is rather a collection of farms than of — 
houses, Windsor, its nearest considerable village, 
being seven miles away; its nearest town, Bingham- 
ton, a dozen miles from Windsor. All the child’s 
early years were passed in a tract of smiling country, 
where hills, woods, fertile fields, and the winding 
stream of the Susquehanna expressed the beauty 
and friendliness of nature with nothing of its savagery. 
These gracious influences became a rich endowment. 
Nature did for her what it did for Wordsworth’s 
Lucy, imparted to her its mystery, its poise, its soli- 
tude, its rhythmic change, its freedom from haste 
and affectation. Social being as she afterwards be- 
came, her days with dumb things were fortunately 
preparatory. ‘They taught her to know the elemental 
background of human existence, to respect it, ‘te. 


18 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


value in herself and others the blind motions of its 
unconscious wisdom, and to carry into subsequent 
life and literature the senses it had trained. She 
used to pity persons born in cities, and thought that 
the country-bred were provided with securer sources 
of happiness. Throughout life, when she would chase 
fatigue and fear, she fled from “‘the great town’s 
harsh heart-wearying roar’? and quickly renewed 
herself by lying in green grass or walking by the bank 
of a favorite brook in the deep woods. There she 
needed no other companion than the hopping birds. 
With them she was an intimate from her earliest 
years, and she became in later life an expert in their 
names and ways. One of her most successful ad- 
dresses was on the glories of a country life; and I 
remember her saying that the opening sections of 
Emerson’s Essay on Nature affected her as if they 
were the recollections of her brooding childhood. 
Her refinement had ever an earthy stock beneath it, 
so that she was not easily shocked or inclined to 
count common things unclean. She loved to mix 
with horses. She knew the farmyard, the country 
road, the breeding cattle, and the upturned soil; and 
she cared for them as heartily as for college girls, 
picture galleries, and companies where there are 
‘quick returns of courtesy and wit.” When Ulysses 
stepped naked from the thicket on the seashore, 
Nausicaié’s maidens fled, while she herself stood 


CHILDHOOD 19 


unalarmed to learn what he might need. Alice 
Freeman’s country training enabled her all her days 
to behave as did the Pheacian princess. 

But persons were with the child as well as natural 
objects. We are all offshoots of a family. Sometimes 
we speak as if each of us were a single individual, 
standing solitary, existing alone; but nothing of the 
sort is true. The smallest conceivable personality is 
threefold, — father, mother, child. No one of us 
starts as an individual or can ever after become such, 
being essentially social, a member merely, a part of a 
larger whole. It is therefore of extreme consequence, 
if our life is to be a fortunate one, that the family of 
which we are portions shall be noble and have a high 
descent. That was the case with Alice Freeman; 
for though on both sides, so far as I am aware, few 
of her ancestors figured in the newspapers, or had 
any considerable share of wealth or learning, they 
we.e of that sturdy stock which has been the glory 
of America — men and women who in quiet homes 
pride themselves on duty and intelligence, who 
think about each day’s work and carefully accom- 
plish it; people on whom neighbors can rely, and 
who are willing to be overlooked in the public inter- 
est. James Warren Freeman, the hard-working, 
self-forgetting father, was of Scottish blood. His 
mother was a Knox; her father being James Knox 


of Washington’s Life Guard. From her father 


20 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Alice derived much of her moral beauty, and also 
that gleam of red which undershot her dark hair. 
Perhaps too from his side came some of her love 
of adventure; for her paternal grandfather walked 
from Connecticut through the wilderness and be- 
came one of the first settlers of Central New York. 

The mother, Elizabeth Josephine Higley — her 
‘mother Elvira Frost — was one of five beautiful 
daughters of a Colesville farmer. Their dark hair 
and large eyes passed over to the child, their vivacity 
too, and their forceful intellectual disposition. 
Mother and grandmother had been for brief terms 
teachers. The mother herself had unusual execu- 
tive ability and a strong disposition to improve 
social conditions around her. She interested herself 
in temperance, and in legislation for the better pro- 
tection of women and children. In later years, af- 
ter a long illness had led her to reflect on the lack 
of medical provision for women, she raised by her 
own efforts, though far from rich herself, sufficient 
money to build and equip an extensive hospital 
for women in her city of Saginaw. Both father 
and mother were of large physical frame, tough 
in fibre, and capable of enduring constant toil. 
But on the mother’s side there was a tendency to 
consumption. 

When Alice was born, her mother was but seven- 
teen and a half years old. “I grew up with my 


CHILDHOOD 21 


‘mother,”’ she used to say. In the next five years came 

a boy and two girls. Neither Mrs. Freeman nor her 
husband had inherited property, and the conditions 
of farming in a young country are severe. I remem- 
ber Alice’s speaking of the rarity of fresh meat in 
her childhood, and of associations of luxury with a 
keg of salt mackerel. On these isolated farms no 
servants were kept, nor were means of communica- 
tion easy. Newspapers, letters, and books were rare. 
The family itself was the community. Comforts 
were little thought of. He was lucky who could 
command the necessities. 

It is now acknowledged that the most question~ 
able advantage of large wealth is its influence on 
‘children. Those who acquire it are likely enough 
to grow with its pursuit, and the control over the 
world which it brings to its vigorous accumulator is 
not unfavorable to enjoyment or to still further ad- 
vance. But children who have never known want 
get few deep draughts of joy. Whoever prizes human 
conditions in proportion to their tendency to develop 
powers must commiserate the children of the rich 
and think of them as our unfortunate classes. They 
associate less with their parents than do others; their 
goings and comings are more hampered; they are 
not so easily habituated to regular tasks; they are 
pressed less to experiment, foresee, adapt; they have 
less stimulus to energetic excellence, and when 


22 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


tempted to vice or mediocrity they have little counter- 
compulsion to support their better purpose. Wise 
rich parents know these dangers and give their 
most anxious thought to shielding their children 
from the enervating influence of wealth. 

At the opposite extreme, poverty is for certain 
children, and at certain ages, tonic in its effect. It 
may be too severe and become blighting. Middle 
conditions are for the average undoubtedly safest. 
At the time of turning from childhood to youth there 
appears in the normal child a craving for the expan- 
sion of personal tastes. If this cannot in some measure 
be gratified, damage results. The child is stunted. 
At an earlier age the importance of money is less 
clear. The child’s nature determines whether nar- 
row means are to be a blessing or a curse. A gentle 
child, slow, unobservant, unromantic, little disposed 
to projecting itself into things, is in danger of being 
crushed by a bleak environment, or at least of hav- 
ing its undesirable qualities confirmed. It grows up 
dull, coarse, or bitter. But little children of a more 
ageressive type are nourished by poverty and in it 
are often afforded their best opportunity for early 
expansion. 

So it was with small Alice Freeman. She found a 
careful home fortunate, or possibly made it so; for 
in her case the distinction between finding and mak- 
ing was seldom quite clear. She has often assured 


CHILDHOOD 23 


me of the happiness of her childhood; and one can 
see how to so rich a nature — alert, forceful, and 
creative — the exactitudes of a restricted existence 
might not be unfriendly. In that environment the 
fourfold germs of the moral sense very early gathered 
their proper warmth, and grew delightedly toward 
God, and toward her superiors, inferiors, and equals. 

In this home God was reverenced and man con- 
tent. Both parents were profoundly religious, the 
father an elder of the Presbyterian church. Whatever 
came therefore, gentle or severe, was felt to come 
with kindness and to bring its call to cheerful and 
considered acceptance. In such serious circumstances 
the words of the Bible, of the Pilgrim’s Progress, of 
the great hymns, penetrate the soul with a depth of 
meaning incredible to those who read them carelessly 
or in the intervals of other exciting volumes. Re- 
ligion roots best in isolation. “Be still, and know 
that I am God,” says the Psalmist. In the silence 
of the country a child can hear God’s voice. Then 
too, whatever the hardships were or however severe, 
they were shared; and difficulties met together 
strengthened the dearest of human ties. To her 
young mother Alice soon became rather a sister than 
a child, a peculiar relation maintained through life, 
and more natural at that time because there was 
usually in the house an aunt or two of about her 
own years. 


24 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Where too there was:so little money and so much 
to do, the smallest tock part in the universal work;. 
no burdensome part, but one which, though a kind. 
of play, contributed to the common gain. Sociologists 
say that the sports of animals and children are edu- 
cative, really performances in miniature and for pure 
pleasure, of the employments of later life. This 
buoyant child found participation in the daily toil 
such an anticipatory sport, and almost from infancy 
helpfulness grew habitual. About as soon as she 
could walk she was employed to call her father from. 
the field, to assist her mother with the dishes and the: 
beds, and to gather eggs from the barn. When she: 
was five, she had three younger children to attend, 
henceforth her daily charge. She dressed them, 
brushed their hair, took them to school, and per-. 
formed all those offices of the little mother which 
fall upon the eldest girl in a household of slender 
means. ‘These are the kindergartens of the country, 
admirable training schools for such small persons. 
as can meet their requirements. At an age when 
children of the well-to-do are hardly out of their: 
nurses’ arms Alice Freeman was already well started 
in heartfelt dependence on the Eternal, in the cheer- 
ful performance of regular work, in lightening the 
labor of those above her, and in accepting respon-. 
sibility for those below. Any one can see how these 
early habits prepared her for future power. | 


CHILDHOOD Q5 


Intellectually her case seems less favorable. A 
district school, of the disordered and elementary 
sort usual in a sparsely settled country, was the only 
one accessible. Its teacher was paid two dollars a 
week and “boarded round.” To it Alice went when 
she was four. But already at three she had taught 
herself to read, and her beautiful voice was always 
afterwards much in request for reading aloud — 
excellent preparation for subsequent public speaking. 
Though books were few, they were read many times, 
about the only mode of reading which yields profit 
to the young. Favorite poems were committed to 
memory. Alice’s first public appearance, occasioned 
by one of these, amusingly illustrates her instinct- 
ive identification of herself with those around. 

When five years old she was taken to a village 
gathering, where the entertainment chiefly consisted of 
music and speeches. While these incomprehensible 
_ matters were in progress she was allowed to fall 
asleep, but at the appropriate moment was waked, 
stood on a table, and told to repeat her poem. It 
was one she was fond of, and she spoke it with the 
same fervor as if she were alone. ‘The delighted 
audience broke into applause. But their feelings at 
once became hers too, and she clapped her little 
hands as heartily as did any of her hearers. Her 
parents from the beginning knew her to be a golden 
child and gave much care to her mental growth. 


26 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


To it the country also brought its precious contribu- 
tions. The natural thoughts of a child, the poet says, 
“are long, long thoughts.” Thoughts of these dimen- 
sions come most easily in the country. A daguerreo- 
type of her, taken when she was five and published 
here, shows that she already has them. 

Then too while country life, especially in the early 
years, benumbs the intellect that is merely scholastic, 
it calls into perpetual activity the practical intellect 
in those fortunate enough to possess it. In the coun- 
try, when one needs anything, he cannot step into a 
neighboring store and purchase for his use what has 
been provided by the forethought of others. He is 
dependent on himself. He must find, invent, or go 
without his article; either master nature or be mas- 
tered by her. It is true that in the long run the 
majority of country people are mastered and tamely 
submit to daily inconvenience. Nevertheless it is a 
great advantage to a vigorous young person, destined 
for future affairs, to be brought up where there is 
little division of labor, where therefore ready wits 
and practical good sense are at a constant premium. 
On the whole we must count Alice Freeman fortu- 
nate in those early circumstances which shaped her 
originally strong intelligence and fitted it for diverse 
and ready action. 

But there is one danger which besets so restricted 
a household. However intelligent, industrious, or 


Portrait at five years 








Fo 
3 


Wits 

be 
LAY 
ri 


y 
PP 
eae 
} j 
‘ 





CHILDHOOD QT 


brave, it tends to routine and to resting satisfied with 
the supply of daily needs. Ideals die under too great 
pressure. But that was not the case here; for hers 
were ambitious parents, ambitious for attaining 
wider work through self-improvement. The father 
was a man of unusual kindness, much disposed to 
look after those about him. By degrees the idea of 
Lecoming a physician took strong hold of him. It 
was encouraged by his wife, who offered to maintain 
herself and the four children during the two years’ 
absence necessary for his training at the Albany 
Medical School. And this was actually accomplished 
between Alice’s seventh and ninth years. Where — 
means were found for maintaining father and family 
during the audacious interval I have never been able 
to discover. Of course the cares of the household 
were doubled, yet in so splendid a cause as to fix 
forever in the mind of one of them the wisdom of 
sacrificing present comforts to ideal ends. Alice 
Freeman never forgot those glorious years. They 
were among the few events of her childhood to which 
she often referred; for they set a pattern to which 
she was ever after eager to conform, of noble aims, 
willing suffering, resourcefulness, persistence, and 
ultimate arrival at greater ability to serve. 

When Dr. Freeman returned, equipped for pro- 
fessional work, a change of residence became ad- 
visable. The farm was abandoned and a house was 


28 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


taken in the village of Windsor. Practice came 
quickly to one who was as truly a physician of the 
mind and soul as of the body. Soon it extended over 
miles of the surrounding country. In his long rides 
among his scattered patients a little girl accom- 
panied her father. ‘To drive was exhilarating; she 
talked to him on the road; she held the horse during 
his visit; and when he came forth grave from the bed- 
side, she shared his anxieties over the dangerous 
case. So the intimacy between the pair grew strong. 
Among her papers written in later life I find a pas- 
sage evidently suggested by these early years in 
which she uses their happy memories to interpret 
similar experiences in the life of a friend who had. 
died. Of this friend she writes : — 

“She was fortunate in being bred in the country, 
responsive to its birds and flowers, to the stars above 
her head and the stones under her feet, and to the 
simplicity of its quiet pleasures. A country doctor’s 
granddaughter, she came close in childhood to his 
good and high influence, close to sickness, to sorrow, 
to hardship, and to loss. In sympathetic relations 
with him she learned to love humankind in all de- 
grees of trouble and poverty, as well as to rejoice in 
natural beauty. She has told me of that village home: 
and her village friends. We who knew her used often 
to say, even down to these last years, ‘You have a. 
girl’s heart and a country girl’s loves and enthusi-~ 


CHILDHOOD. | 29. 


asms.’ It made no difference that she went forth 
into high public station. She brought back from the 
drawing-rooms of Washington and the salons of 
Paris the highmindedness, the human affections, and 
the swift sympathies which her grandfather gave her 
through long contact with sorrow and heart-break.”’ 
It would be hard to describe more exactly what 
Alice Freeman derived from her father, and _per- 
haps it may be well to show here the permanence of 
that influence, and the sort of passionate devotion it 
fixed in her for the silent man who gave it. I quote 
some lines which she wrote the year before she died. 
Dr. Freeman had been struck down by a violent. 
illness which seemed likely to bring sudden death. 
She was summoned from Cambridge by telegraph. 
As she rode she wrote the following verses, showing 
them to no one. After her death I found them among 
her papers, marked “On the Train, April 12, 1902.” 
The reference in the fifth stanza is to her sister 
Stella, who had died twenty-three years before. 


How long and weary stretch the miles away 
Between us, O my father, as I come 

To catch again your dear voice, if I may, 
Here in our earthly home. 


Perhaps ere this your lips are cold and still; 
Perhaps you hear the angels’ triumph song, 


30 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


And smile upon us from some heavenly hill 
The blessed saints among. 


They are not sick or sorry any more; 
And you are strong and young and glad again. 
What will you do on that wide shining shore 
Where all are free from pain? 


All your long life you healed the sick and sad; 
You gave as God gives, counting not the cost. 

Your presence made the little children glad; 
With you no soul was lost. 


How many happy ones will greet you there 
About our starlike girl, so long away! 

Ah, but to see her shining eyes and hair 
As on that sad June day! 


I will not grieve, my father, for your peace. 
I will rejoice if you have won your rest 

Where Springs fade not, where sorrows ever cease, 
And all the good are blest. 


ii 


GIRLHOOD 


TuE settlement at Windsor marks a second period 
in Alice Freeman’s life. By degrees she turns from 
childhood to girlhood. What the nature of the change 
is, or at what precise time it occurs, is seldom evident 
either to onlookers or to the child herself. But the 
transition, though gradual, is momentous and not 
altogether pleasing. In Alice Freeman I judge it 
appeared about two years earlier than ordinary. 

Girlhood begins when little by little the child 
comes to think for herself and to regard herself as 
a person of importance. She accordingly seeks to 
assert and enlarge that importance. Earlier than this 
she has hardly had possession of her powers. By 
herself and others she has been accounted merely a 
member of a family. Few articles are called hers. 
Her wishes are not much regarded. She is included 
in family plans, but has too little experience and 
foresight to form them. Very properly she is ex- 
pected to subordinate herself to her elders, the chief 
work of the years of childhood being to train us to 
live in collective fashion. We then accept the property, 
knowledge, beliefs, habits, ideals accumulated in the 


32 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


family group. During absorptive childhood we have 
little which we have not received. 

Maturity discloses more. Gradually we become 
aware of something precious within us which is just 
ourself. We are somebody. The consciousness that I 
am I parts me from others. Not that we then cease 
to recognize duties to the family. These continue, but 
undergo a change. Henceforth we perform them in 
freedom, conscious that we too are persons of im- 
portance and have duties to ourselves as well. Other 
people are now discovered to be “selves ” also, and the 
adjustment of us to them becomes a puzzling prob- 
lem. The period when this self-consciousness begins 
to make itself felt is usually an awkward one. ‘The 
early spontaneous charm has disappeared, while 
personal dignity has not yet arisen. Jarrings and 
antagonisms are ordinary indications that such a 
period is approaching. 

That one so sympathetic as Alice Freeman would 
be saved from the worst of such clashes may easily 
be guessed. I can learn of few of the self-assertions 
and aberrations which usually appear in this epoch- 
making transition. She had a will of her own, was 
liable to anger, and easily resented personal annoy- 
ance. But her consciousness of much beside herself 
steadied her. Even in parting from the family she 
took the family with her. Once at evening prayers 
a large June-bug buzzed through the window and 


YIOX MON ‘IOSpurA SosNOH uvulse1,7 oY} WOIj WOOS Sv 


AATIVA VNNVHANOSNAS AHL 








aia Ura Meniee e oh ) ) Oe 


GIRLHOOD > 33 


settled in a curl of her hair. He would not be de- 
tached. She kept herself quiet through the several 
minutes of prayer; then, as all rose from their knees, 
she cried out, “I wanted to scream, but I could n’t 
upset you and God.” “Of course not,” said. her 
father, gravely dislodging the creature. For a good. 
while bursts of passion broke out when her will was 
crossed. She would throw herself down and beat the. 
floor with her heels. But when one day she saw her 
brother in a similar paroxysm, she examined him 
with horror and at bedtime told her mother that she 
should never be angry again. “Fred must n’t be.” 
And though through after life rage at wrong often 
boiled below the surface and came to an occasional 
explosion, it was soon controlled, and rarely parted 
her from him who occasioned it. 

- Yet however considerately the transition was 
managed, childhood, the period of absorption in the 
family, was ending as Alice Freeman settled into 
the new life at Windsor; self-seeking girlhood began, 
an epoch stretching forward as far as the attainment 
of the college degree. In this period the vigorous 
girl or boy longs for enlargement, the forces ordi- 
narily impelling most powerfully toward it being 
education, love, and religion. All these came to 
Alice Freeman, as they come to every girl; but te 
her they came unusually early, orderly, and trans; 
formingly. 


34 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


The considerable village of Windsor where the 
family was now living contained a school of supe- 
rior rank, Windsor Academy. Its principal, Joseph 
Eastman, was a man of more breadth than most 
country towns can show. After graduating from 
Dartmouth, he had gone through the Harvard Medi- 
cal School and Andover Theological Seminary. He 
was now both minister of the Presbyterian Church 
in the village and principal of the Academy. Besides 
himself the Academy employed half a dozen other 
teachers, gave instruction in the languages, and was 
the finishing school for most of its students. It was 
much like one of our modern high schools, though 
of looser organization and without the dominant aim 
of preparing its pupils for college. On coming to 
Windsor Dr. Freeman did much to raise its grade 
and to change it from the school of a village to an 
academy for all the country around. ‘This school 
Alice entered in September, 1865. Here her real 
education began. Previously she had been her own 
teacher, or had picked up what little was to be had on 
the benches of a district school. Here at the age of 
ten she learned to mix with a considerable company 
of giris and boys, to feel the influence of accomplished 
teachers, to see how large is the field of knowledge 
and how small the amount which any one can gather. 
Young as she was, she eagerly seized her opportunity 
and began to form interests of her own. Throughout 


GIRLHOOD 35 


life she acknowledged her indebtedness to this 
wmportant school; and when in 1901 the Academy 
celebrated its semi-centennial, she visited it and 
renewed her gratitude to it and its pretty village. 
From a report of her address on that occasion I take 
the following passage : — 

“Words do not tell what this old school and place 
meant to me as a girl. I am proud to say that I was 
the daughter of a farmer of the Susquehanna, and 
for me there never can be another such village as 
this. When I graduated in 1872 and went a thousand 
miles westward to college, I bore away remembrances 
of our magnificent river, its enormous width, strong 
currents, and terrible freshets. But I recall that 
when a college classmate came home with me for a 
vacation, her eyes were reproachful as she said, ‘I 
thought you told me it was larger than the Missis- 
sippi.’ I believed then that all the nicest people lived 
in Windsor; that all the patriots of the country were 
of our political party — no matter which party; and 
that all the good people belonged to the Presbyterian 
Church. No one told me so, but I believed it. I have 
changed my mind about some things since then. 
But my faith in the old school has not grown less, 
but more. Here we gathered abundant Greek, Latin. 
French and Mathematics, though we have forgotten 
a part; here we were taught truthfulness, to be up- 
right and honorable; here we had our first loves, cur 


36 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


first hopes, our first ambitions, our first dreams, and 
some of us our first disappointments. We owe a 
large debt to Windsor Academy for the solid ground- 
work of education which it laid.” I still have her 
little Greek ‘Testament with the name of the gree 
penciled on the fly-leaf. 

That from the first she was something of a leader 
in the school I infer from the following anecdote. 
In the winter of 1867, when she was twelve, four 
schools of Broome County held a literary contest. 
Each school was to prepare a set of compositions. 
‘These were to be put in charge of a delegate for 
arrangement and for public reading. The other 
schools chose teachers as delegates; Windsor chose 
her. She carried off the prize on all three counts: 
for arrangement, for reading, and for her own 
composition. 

In 1868 a deeper impulse began. There came to 
the Academy a singularly inspiring teacher. Such an 
event has formed the turning-point of many a life, 
and more often than any other has been decisive in 
bringing about a studious career. Some one person 
has vitalized knowledge for us— it matters little 
what branch — and almost magically our vague and 
variable desires for learning, power, public service, 
become crystallized and take a shape which de- 
fies the batterings of after years. Personal influence 
is a commanding factor everywhere; but nowhere 


GIRLHOOD | 37 


has it so immediate or lasting an effect as in the 
schools. 

Alice’s teacher was a young man who, after grad- 
uating from Union College, had spent a year in 
Princeton Theological Seminary. Being in debt for 
his college education, he thought it well before ad- 
vancing further toward his profession to teach a 
while at Windsor. There he deeply influenced the 
whole school, for his character was as strong as his 
scholarship. But he had the discernment to single 
aut a child in one of the lower classes, and to this 
large-eyed girl gave special care. Apparently from 
the first he knew her precocious ability. Whether. 
she would ever have known it if he had not given her 
insight, I have doubted. He taught her both ac- 
curacy and enthusiasm. He made her think herself 
worth while. He lent her books, fashioned her tastes, 
talked with her, walked with her, showed her a great 
human being to admire, made clearer her reverence 
for Nature and for God, and in the two years of their 
acquaintance transformed her into a woman. Was 
it strange that he then began to love her whom he 
had seemed to create? I have told how she was 
always long in advance of her years. His sure eye 
knew incipient excellence, and his idealizing nature 
enjoyed beauty before it was blown. One gets a high 
impression of a man who could be so affected by an 
unfolding thing. On her side there seems to have 


38 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


been dumb wonder and obedient esteem. How could 
she refuse what one so exalted asked? She could 
comprehend little of his love. Through all he had 
done for her she had more easily felt a great in- 
fluence than understood its words. But if in that 
high region where he lived he wished her company, 
her merry laughter, her picture, her hand, who else 
could have an equal right? With few girlish dreams 
and small foresight of the future, but seriously and 
with dignity, she consented to an engagement at 
fourteen. 

In every deep nature thoughts of love are allied 
with thoughts of God. This year she joined the 
Presbyterian Church. It is a heroic moment for any 
one of us when, face to face with God, we formally 
announce that henceforth we are accountable to Him 
alone. It marks the attainment of full self-conscious- 
ness. The young soul now takes itself in charge and 
says, “ Mine is the decision. I have chosen my way 
bf laying hold on life.” ‘The authority of parents is 
at an end, supplanted by the laws of reason, right- 
eousness, and human welfare. So at least Alice 
Freeman understood her crisis. To it education, 
Jove, and religion all contributed. Experiences which 
fall upon most of us separately and at much later 
periods she encountered in their collective force 
when she had barely entered her teens. Her scale of 
growth is different from the ordinary. She needed to 


GIRLHOOD $y 


start early, so as to pack into her forty-seven years 
what others hardly include in their threescore and ten. 

Always devout, she now consecrated herself, and 
for the rest of her life the desire for the utmost serv- 
ice of God’s children seems to inspire every private 
impulse. In her case religion did not appear in its 
negative character, as restraint; it always signified 
joyous freedom and enlargement. It brought as- 
surance of humanity’s kinship with the power which 
dominates all. No situation can therefore arise in 
which hostile forces are engaged against us, nor 
need we be crushed by an indifferent world. Every 
harshest circumstance contains some novel mode of 
access to God and our broader life. Of these matters 
she seldom spoke. I never knew her to argue them. 
They merely represent her working conviction, con- 
firmed by every day’s experience. Thus she viewed 
things, and things were ever ready to respond. Most 
of us lightly assume as an ultimate ground of all 
some sort of blind force, incomprehensible stuff 
which we should be incapable of demonstrating if 
challenged. She thought personal life as she knew 
it in herself more intelligible, particularly as it ren- 
dered an otherwise stupid world intelligible too, and 
enabled her everywhere to live in her Father’s house. 

But the broader outlook on life now gained was 
not altogether favorable to her engagement. Her 
lover had let loose forces which soon passed beyond 


40 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


his control. He had revealed her worth, a worth 
which involved responsibility for its care. He had 
opened unsuspected capacities which must now be 
filled. Through him, the first college graduate she 
had known, she discovered what the higher training 
signifies. She was to be a fellow-worker with God. 
To make herself as efficient as possible became then 
the most urgent of duties. These were the thoughts 
which gradually took shape in her puzzled mind 
during the years 1869-71. For the paths of culture 
and allegiance soon divided. In 1870 he was to 
enter Yale Theological Seminary and make his final 
preparation for the ministry. He proposed that she 
should spend this time in completing her course at 
Windsor, and afterwards join him in some country 
parish. The proposal revealed what marriage with 
him would mean. In it she would give but half her- 
self. Such a fictitious union would dishonor both 
him and her. She was too young, too unexpanded. 
Until she had undergone college discipline she would 
not have matured herself sufficiently to deserve a 
strong man’s love. Marriage, as she now and hence- 
forth conceived it, was to be a comradeship of equals 
where each contributes rich powers of different kinds 
to a mutual life. 

Accordingly six months after he had left her for 
New Haven they parted, parted with kindness and 
deep respect. He no less than she approved the 


GIRLHOOD ‘41 


separation. I believe they never met again. After 
two years in Yale Seminary he became a minister, 
and until his death was loved by all who knew him. 
He married, and had a daughter whom he named 
Alice. Neither could ever have regretted any part 
of the invigorating connection. She has repeatedly 
spoken to me of her debt to him who first awakened 
her, to him who accompanied her so delicately 
through difficult paths of decision, and who was in 
himself so admirable. | 

Nor did his chivalrous protection of her cease 
with his departure. In his company she had learned 
once for all what she desired in marriage, and she 
was henceforth guarded against casual and un- 
worthy impulses as few young women are. It was 
often thought strange that one of such beauty, re- 
sponsiveness, and social opportunity could so long 
remain single. In all other experiences of life she 
anticipated her sex. Was this delay due to disparage- 
ment of marriage? No, but to the very reverse. And 
because I perceive how impossible it is to make her 
career comprehensible if I conceal these intimate 
facts, I here set down a simple statement of them. 

One set of difficulties in the way of going to college 
was now removed. Another remained. Her parents 
opposed the plan. Few had ever gone to college from 
those parts, nor was it usual for girls to go at all. 
The family means were scanty, though slightly im- 


42 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


proved since farming days. The younger children 
were becoming expensive. Dr. Freeman told his 
daughter that it would be impossible for more than 
one of the children to be given a college education, 
and that this one ought to be the son, as he must 
ultimately support the family. Alice declared that 
she meant to have a college degree if it took her till 
she was fifty to get it. If her parents could help her, 
even partially, she would promise never to marry 
until she had herself put her brother through college 
and given to each of her sisters whatever education 
they might wish—a promise subsequently per- 
formed. She pointed out the importance to all the 
family of her becoming one of its supports instead 
of one of its dependents. The discussions were long 
and grave, but her judgment finally prevailed. She 
was to graduate from the Academy at seventeen, and 
it was agreed that she should then immediately enter 
college. 

In the year before she went two events occurred 
deserving mention. ‘The Windsor church found that 
its evening meetings were unattractive on account 
of inadequate light. There was no central chande- 
lier, and the few lamps scattered about the room left 
it cheerless. Though Alice was then gathering means 
for her college course, she presented a chandelier to 
the church, earning the money that winter and going 
without a, coat. 


GIRLHOOD 43 


During the winter, too, Anna Dickinson came to 
Binghamton for an evening lecture on Joan of Arc. 
Alice had never heard a woman speak. She per- 
suaded her father to take her in the sleigh over the 
more than twenty miles of dark country road, and 
was deeply moved by the speaker. 

In deciding on a college the range of choice was 
small. Wellesley, Smith, and Bryn Mawr were not 
yet in existence. Mount Holyoke was still a “ Female 
Seminary,” and Elmira hardly more, though legally 
a college. To this latter she might naturally have 
gone, as the college for girls nearest at hand. But 
she had been reading college catalogues, and knew 
’ that Elmira standards were low. To Vassar, which 
had just been founded, she seems to have inclined 
for a moment. But was it a true college, or merely 
another Elmira? A boy in her class who was pre- 
paring for Amherst hinted that these girls’ colleges 
were a contrivance for enabling women to pretend 
that they had the same education as men. She had 
suspected as much herself, and, being determined to 
get the best, had already begun to turn toward 
coeducation. But coeducational colleges were at 
that time few. Michigan was the strongest of them, 
and had opened its doors to women only two years 
before. That, then, distant though it was, she 
chose. 


iV 


THE UNIVERSITY 


In June, 1872, Dr. Freeman took his daughter 
to Ann Arbor to see the University, attend Com- 
mencement, and pass the entrance examinations. 
But here her resolution met with a sharp rebuff. She 
failed. Good as the Academy had been for supplying 
general knowledge, it was poorly equipped for pre- 
paring pupils for college. The failure, however, 
proved as fortunate as everything else which befell 
this favored girl, for it brought her to the notice of 
the remarkable man who from that day took her 
under his peculiar charge. President Angell himself 
shall tell the story: — 

*“*In 1872, when Alice Freeman presented herself 
at my office, accompanied by her father, to apply 
for admission to the University, she was a simple, 
modest girl of seventeen. She had pursued her studies 
in the little Academy at Windsor. Her teachers re- 
garded her as a child of much promise, precocious, 
possessed of a bright, alert mind, of great industry, 
of quick sympathies, and of an instinctive desire to 
be helpful to others. Her preparation for college 
had been meagre, and both she and her father were 


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THE UNIVERSITY 45 


doubtful of her ability to pass the required examina- 
lions. The doubts were not without foundation. 
The examiners, on inspecting her work, were in- 
clined to decide that she ought to do more prepara- 
tory work before they could accept her. Meantime 
I had had not a little conversation with her and her 
father, and had been impressed with her high intel- 
ligence. At my request the examiners decided to 
allow her to enter on a trial of six weeks. I was con- 
fident she would demonstrate her capacity to go on 
with her class. I need hardly add that it was soon 
apparent to her instructors that my confidence was 
fully justified. She speedily gained and constantly 
held an excellent position as a scholar.” 

But the deficiencies of the past hampered progress. 
Already she was much in need of rest after the strain 
of preparation; yet all the summer before entrance 
had to be spent in clearing away conditions, and she 
remained in Ann Arbor through the vacations of that 
year, engaged in study for the same purpose. This 
business of removing conditions went on, too, side 
by side with the regular college work, lowering the 
grade of the latter and causing frequent exhaustion. 
At intervals the assistance of a teacher became 
necessary, still further depleting her scanty means. 
Throughout her college course solicitudes over time, 
health, and money never ceased. Yet anxieties seem 
rather to have caused elation over what was already 


46 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


had than depression over what might be missed. 
College training had been so long desired that it was 
welcomed now on any terms. 

And indeed on almost any terms it is delightful. 
For most of us the period of learning is a period of 
romance. We are young, and all things are possi- 
ble. Every circumstance is novel, calculated in some 
way to serve our growth and happiness. Even those 
of us who have spent our early years in toil learn 
at last how to profit by play. We make a few intimate 
friends and a wide circle of acquaintances. We 
fashion our ideals, compare them with those about 
us, and have them sharply criticised. The physical 
world more deeply discloses its wonders. ‘Through 
many avenues we enter into the heritage of the race. 
Whatever is precious in the past and has been 
thought worth preserving in the caskets called books 
is offered for our enrichment. And in our teachers 
we have wise guides who not only conduct us to these 
treasures, but point out their human significance. 
It must be an abnormal girl or boy who does not 
count such years happy. 

All this Miss Freeman felt. To her the absurdly 
named town of Ann Arbor was ever afterwards 
sacred soil. She visited it as often as possible, and 
everywhere her face brightened at the sight of a 
classmate. Notwithstanding many disturbances, she 
has repeatedly told me of the extreme pleasure and 


THE UNIVERSITY 47 


profit of these years; and in her little book, “‘Why 
Go to College,”’ she has given a glowing picture of 
the gain which the experiences of college bring to 
every earnest girl. I regret therefore that most of 
her college letters, being chiefly of a business nature, 
imperfectly express her gaiety or even her studious 
interests. From them, however, aided by the recol- 
lection of classmates, I am able to present a tolerable 
account of her intellectual, social, religious, physical, 
and financial progress during these college years. 
Her scholarly work cannot, I suppose, be called 
quite solid. There was too much of it for that. The 
regular studies were abundant; the addition of those — 
which should have been ended in the preparatory 
school made the amount burdensome; and _ this 
became overwhelming when increased by the worthy 
engagements outside study which in this place of 
opportunity solicited a hitherto secluded girl. From 
intellectual disaster she was saved by a peculiarity 
of her constitution. To an astonishing degree she 
was always swiftly absorptive. Whatever in her 
neighborhood contained human nutriment was per- 
ceived and seized at once. All became hers with 
slight expenditure of time or effort. Throughout life 
she gathered half-instinctively an amount of know- 
ledge which others obtain only by toil. A mother 
whose son was in the University at this time relates 
how he used to come home saying, “‘There’s a girl 


43 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


in my class who knows everything — everything!” 


And one who was associated with her in the teaching 
of history at Wellesley tells me that she herself 
rarely gained any new historic insight and reported 
it to Miss Freeman without finding that Miss Free- 
man was familiar with it already. Indeed her sym- 
pathy with truth was so broad and discerning that 
reality opened itself to her on every side. Could she 
have had more leisure at the University, she might 
have distinguished herself there; though perhaps 
even then her liking for every species of knowledge 
would have prevented eminence. She would not 
concentrate attention on certain subjects to the neg- 
Ject of others. Such specialization was less the habit 
of her day than of ours. So she was free to approach 
all, and in all she managed to obtain a good rank. 
History, Greek, English literature, and to some 
extent mathematics, were the studies that left the 
deepest impression, chiefly, I suspect, because of 
the excellence of the instruction in these subjects. 
Her memory was good and her observation accu- 
rate. I think she retained more of what she learned 
than iscommon. One is often struck with the small 
stock of knowledge carried off from study, even by 
those who obtain through it decided intellectual ad- 
vantage. Maturing influences and facts acquired 
seem to have little relation; and no doubt if one of 
these is to be lost, the detailed truths had better 


THE UNIVERSITY 49 


go. Miss Freeman kept a good balance between 
the contrasted gains. During these years her mind 
grew rapidly in range, subtlety, coherence, and in 
persistent power of work. But she bore away also 
a body of knowledge which served her well in her 
career as a teacher and in the subsequent varied 
demands of a busy life. At Commencement a part 
was assigned her, one of the first granted to the girl 
students of Michigan. President Angell tells me it 
captured the attention of her audience and held it 
firmly throughout. Its subject was “‘’The Relations 
of Science and Poetry’ — an indication, I suppose, 
that she had already come upon some of the fun- 
damental problems which vex the scholar’s mind. 

But of at least equal importance with the know- 
ledge acquired in college is the influence on a student 
of the personality of his teachers. Some of these, it 
is true, will always be mere purveyors of knowledge; 
others, more insignificant still, inspectors of what has 
been learned already. But in every college faculty 
there are pretty sure to be certain men of mark, from 
whom — sometimes in the course of instruction, 
sometimes through personal acquaintance — a stu- 
dent half-imperceptibly carries off impressions and 
impulses of incalculable worth. In such weighty 
personalities the University of Michigan in Miss 
Freeman’s time was exceptionally rich. Half a 
dozen of them helped to shape this responsive girl. 


50 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Of familiar intercourse with her teachers I suspect 
she enjoyed more than is generally obtainable to-day. 
President and Mrs. Angell had her much in their 
beautiful home, as did in different degrees Profes- 
sors D’Ooge, Tyler, and Adams. These men enriched 
her outside the classroom and became her lifelong 
friends. While she was in college they watched over 
her carefully, and when she went forth they opened 
before her the difficult doors of the world. 

In those days women’s education was an anxious 
experiment. At graduation her class contained sixty- 
four men and eleven women. The girls were there- 
fore studied by others and themselves a little unduly. 
Heartily welcomed everywhere though they were, they 
could not take what each day brought quite as a mat- 
ter of course. Being pioneers and representatives 
of many who would come afterwards, they were 
burdened with a sense of responsibility. According as 
they conducted themselves their sisters would have 
ampler or narrower opportunities. Such conscious 
conditions insure uprightness, but are hardly so 
favorable for ease and the graces. They had at least 
the good effect of banding the girls together and 
uniting the little group by something like a family 
tie. Though Miss Freeman was one of the younger 
members of this family, she quickly became its head 
by virtue of her practical sagacity, moral force, and 
personal attractiveness. President Angell writes: — 


THE UNIVERSITY 51 


**One of her most striking characteristics in college 
was her warm and demonstrative sympathy with her 
circle of friends. Her soul seemed bubbling over 
with joy, which she wished to share with the other 
girls. While she was therefore in the most friendly 
relations with all the girls then in college, she was 
the radiant centre of a considerable group whose 
tastes were congenial with her own. Without assum- 
ing or striving for leadership, she could not but be 
to a certain degree a leader among these, some of 
whom have since attained positions only less con- 
spicuous for usefulness than her own. Her nature 
was so large and generous, so free from envy, that | 
she was esteemed by all her comrades, whether they 
cherished exactly her ideals or not. Wherever she 
went, her genial outgoing spirit seemed to carry with 
her an atmosphere of cheerfulness and joy. No girl 
of her time on withdrawing from college would have 
been more missed than she.” 

She joined several college clubs, distinguished her- 
self in the debating society, was fond of long walks 
through the fertile Michigan country, and always had 
leisure for a share in whatever picnic, sleighride, or 
student entertainment called for merriment, adven- 
ture, inventiveness, or social tact. 

Throughout life she thought herself fortunate in 
having chosen a coeducational college. The natural 
association of girls with boys in interests of a noble 


52 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


sort tends, she believed, to broaden their vision, to 
solidify their minds, and to remove much that is hec- 
tic and unwholesome from the awakening instincts of 
sex. She did not think it made girls boyish, or boys 
girlish; but merely that it brought good sense and a 
pleased companionship to take the place of giddi- 
ness and sentimentality. She used to say that co- 
educational marriages seldom appear in the divorce 
courts. I think her own manners— as quiet and 
free among men as among women — owed much of 
their naturalness to the fact that at no period of her 
life did men become strange. Professor Hale of 
Chicago has well said, “It was Mrs. Palmer’s con- 
viction that the normal form of education for both 
sexes is that in which the natural relations — begun 
in the life of the home and the neighborhood, con- 
tinued for the great majority in the life of the school, 
and inevitably existing in the later social life — are 
carried without break through the four years of 
higher intellectual work. She may have been right 
or she may have been wrong; but that such a woman, 
with her personal experience of Ann Arbor, of Welles- 
ley, of Radcliffe, and of Harvard, should have 
held this belief is a fact to be reckoned with.” In 
tracing her development at Ann Arbor we must not 
omit to notice the ability she gained there to com- 
prehend a man’s world. Certainly from that univer- 
sity came many of the best ideals of college structure 


THE UNIVERSITY 53 


which subsequently entered into the foundation of 
Wellesley. I doubt if she could have built that 
woman’s college so strongly if she had not herself 
been trained in the company of men. 

Side by side with the studious and social interests 
of college life went religion, of which they were in 
reality only a special expression; for religion glorified 
her entire existence. One who knew her well at this 
time says that even then “her religious life was of 
that cheerful, inspiring type which characterized it 
in her maturer years and which always commended 
the Christian faith in winsome ways to those who 
came within her influence.” / 

At the beginning of her residence in Ann Arbor 
she connected herself with the Presbyterian Church, 
of which Samuel Willoughby Duffield was the pastor. 
He was a man of enthusiasm and scholarship, in 
many respects akin to herself, and to him she became 
warmly attached. Every Sunday she attended two 
church services, taught in the Sunday School, in a 
mission school also, and was usually present at one 
or two services during the week. But into the College 
Christian Association she threw herself with the 
utmost ardor, vitalizing that body and delivering it 
from the narrowness which in those days often beset 
such organizations. She brought it to represent 
more than a single type of character. While she was 
its leader it became a strong power for righteousness 


54 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


throughout the entire town. To her, too, her class- 
mates, men and women, most naturally turned as a 
spiritual adviser. ‘The knowledge she thus obtained 
of the troubles of the young, real or imaginary, 
proved useful in the larger contacts of later years, 
_ and even now began to shape the ideals of what she 
meant to do. Before she left college, the desire to 
deepen, to lighten, to render more intelligent and 
joyous the lives of girls and women, had become 
osearly defined. 

I have said that consumption was in her family, 
and that from childhood she had never been strong. 
The lungs and heart were weak and there was a dis- 
position to colds and fatigue. ‘That “outgoing spirit” 
too, of which President Angell speaks, continually 
exposed her to excessive strain. Whatever human 
interest or need appeared in her neighborhood was 
pretty sure to receive attention. To consider and 
spare herself never became instinctive, though in 
later years she trained her powers to some degree of 
restraint for the sake of broader use. But swift 
responsiveness and a kind of spendthrift generosity 
have ever been beautiful faults of admirable women. 
Even Providence seems unfairly indulgent to self- 
forgetting souls and unaccountably wards off from 
them appropriate harm. How she accomplished all 
she did, accomplished it too with distinction, is a 
mystery. On account of an interruption in her 


THE UNIVERSITY 55 


junior year, she had as a senior twenty hours a 
week of recitations, and no less as a freshman, 
though her social and religious engagements were 
alone sufficient to fill her time. Yet she graduated, 
as do most girls, stronger than she entered. Studying 
is wholesome business; and after all, college life has 
more regular hours and more invigorating agencies 
than most homes can offer. But considering her in- 
heritance, the exhausting nature of the last two years 
at Windsor, and the burden of her deficient prepara- 
tion, it is not strange that her letters often speak 
of being “tired” and of the hope that her cold “ will 
be better next week.’ One of the professors whom > 
she saw oftenest tells me he frequently remonstrated 
with her over the cough she brought to college, a 
cough which continued until a few years before her 
death. 

Financial anxieties burdened her too. There was 
always uncertainty whether she would be able to 
continue in college another year. From the begins 
ning her parents had strained their slender purse to 
the utmost, and she herself earned whatever was pos- 
sible. But resources still remained small and ex- 
penses large. To bring the two at all together called 
for restraint, courage, ingenuity, and a readiness to 
do things for herself. I have thought it well to print 
one or two letters which show the details of this 
pathetic struggle. They can hardly be read without 


56 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


tears and smiles. But every college teacher will 
recognize them as typical letters, such as still go 
home from every part of the country where brave 
young men and women are using skill and dignity 
to compass knowledge. 

The circumstances of the family had not improved. 
When Miss Freeman entered college, prospects were 
bright. Considerable woodlands on the farm pro- 
mised, if properly developed, to yield a good return; 
but such development required money and constant 
supervision, while a country doctor could furnish 
little of either. In consequence, each year grew 
harder than the one before. Floods too along the 
Susquehanna finally swept away a great body of 
lumber which had gradually been collected there. 
In the middle of her junior year letters from home 
disclosed serious entanglement. She did not wait for 
consultation with her family, but applied at once to 
President Angell for a position as a teacher, accepted 
an appointment, travelled to her new home at 
Ottawa, Illinois, and was already established in her 
duties there before she informed her parents. This 
was in January, 1875, when she was not twenty 
years old. 

The Ottawa High School had suddenly lost its 
principal and needed a prudent management to keep 
it from going to pieces. She became its head. It was 
the first school in which she ever taught, while many 


THE UNIVERSITY 57 


of its pupils were nearly her own age. The other 
schools of the town were subordinate to this, and their 
teachers were men and women of experience. The 
amount of her teaching, principally in Greek and 
Latin, was large; and what was not contracted for, 
though equally necessary, was more difficult still, — 
the winning of the confidence of her pupils and the 
town. She gave of her best. At the close of the 
twenty weeks for which she had engaged herself, 
she was urged by all connected with the school to 
remain in it permanently. But she declined. The 
salary had been ample. Out of it she relieved the 
family necessities and secured the finishing of her 
college course. After spending the summer at home 
she returned to Ann Arbor, making up the omitted 
studies partly during the vacation and partly in con- 
nection with the work of the senior year. 

For the brief selection of letters which follows I 
am fortunate in finding some that picture the ordinary 
current of college affairs; some that show its per- 
plexities; some that reveal a spirit already moving 
toward self-confidence and reform; some written at 
Ottawa, where the first success is had in teaching. 
I do not date them. It is not always possible. And 
they are arranged rather by subject than by time. 
All are youthful, artless, hasty, intended for only 
the receiver’s eye. But surely the lucidity and eleva- 
tion of their young writer will please. 


58 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


LETTERS 


Dear ones at home, you will expect a letter from 
me immediately; so, though I am very tired, I am 
going to write. Read it if you can. I arrived at 
50 State Street at noon about an hour ago, and found 
Mrs. Williams expecting me. I have a pleasant room, 
nicely furnished, with everything any one could 
want, even to bookshelves: a pretty little stove, an 
ingrain carpet, a table and cover. Mrs. Williams 
had dinner waiting, and I am sure it will be a 
pleasant boarding-place. On one side of the house 
there is a large brick building, where there is a 
school for little children. Just now they are mak- 
ing all the noise it is possible for boys to make. On 
the other side they are building a church. So this 
afternoon, when my head aches, my surroundings 
are not quite perfect; but I think I shall get used 
to it after a little while. 

Coming here I rode in the car where you put me, 
without changing until just before reaching Niagara 
Falls. At Elmira a young gentleman and his sister 
came into my car. ‘They were going West too. He 
saw I was alone and spoke to me, after which we 
three went together. The conductor told us if we 
would exchange for a berth on the sleeper we could 
go through to Detroit without further change. So 
the young man took a /erth for his sister and myself, 


THE UNIVERSITY 59 


and slept on a couch near by. They were bound 
for Chicago, and took the drawing-room coach at 
Detroit. We parted company there. It was pleasant 
for me; but we don’t know each other’s names, 
only his sister called him ‘‘Joe.’” He bought us nice 
grapes at London, with which we stained our dresses. 
The car from Detroit to Ann Arbor was crowded, 
but another accommodating young man gave me his 
seat. All the way I have been fortunate and have 
had to spend only $2.75. I shall write again very 
soon. 


I have just passed five examinations and feel 
pretty well satisfied with the result of my semester’s 
work. We had the usual number of visitors and 
spectators. I was called up for oral examination in 
everything, but was fortunate enough not to blunder 
and so can’t complain. 

In Latin something happened which amused the 
boys very much. Professor Frieze has just returned 
from Europe and of course does n’t know any of us 
yet. After we had been writing for some time and 
all the company had come in, our Professor Walter 
called up Miss Freeman. He named one of Horace’s 
long hard Satires, giving me a book and asking me 
to read it, “ thinking it would be interesting to the 
gentlemen.” It happened to be one I knew perfectly, 
and I read it immediately — apparently to the aston- 


60 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


ishment of Professor Frieze. As I finished, Professor 
Walter said to him, ‘‘ Have you any questions? ” 
Professor Frieze looked at me gravely, shook his 
head, and growled, “No. What’s her name?” 
Then the boys laughed. 

In Greek too I could n’t have asked a better chance 
to show off. Professor Pattingill expressed his appro- 
bation. ‘This is boasting enough, but I thought you’d 
want to know how your little girl is prospering. 
There is an unheard-of number conditioned, over 
eighty in one class, but only one girl. Our class, too, 
is noted for its high scholarship. My special studies 
this semester are Juvenal’s Satires, Calculus, and 
Astronomy, with all of which I am delighted. 


I have received all the letters you mention, but have 
only $16.00. Perhaps you have sent more and I have 
made some mistake. But I think not. Never mind. 
Ill pay it all back some time. I ought to settle my 
account here as soon as possible. If papa can send 
me money for the bills I shall be very glad. Provi- 
sions are very high, as usual in spring, and my bills 
are still more at the Club. 

I have been just as economical as possible all the 
year, but of course the money you have been able to 
send has n’t been sufficient. We have had to burn a 
great deal of wood, as it has been and still is very 
cold; and my bill will be a little over $12.00. I had 


THE UNIVERSITY 61 


to get me a new pair of shoes. You know I had only 
the cloth ones which I wore last summer. ‘They 
lasted until this spring. I wore my blue hat just as it 
was all winter, and am wearing my old black one 
now. I got two yards of black ribbon and trimmed 
it myself. I bought a pair of cheap black kid gloves 
a few days ago, some lace for my neck and sleeves, 
and a fresh ribbon. I have got nothing I could do 
without; but you know I have to be dressed well all 
the time in the position I am in. I think I have all 
the books I shall need. They have cost me more 
than usual. But the most of the money you have sent 
has been paid for board. | 

If you can help me through this year I will try as 
best I may to take up the paddle and push my own 
canoe afterwards. Whatever comes, dear mother, I 
know is best for me. It is all right. Still I believe 
God helps only those who help themselves. I shall 
try to do my part, and I fully expect He will do the 
rest. Mother dear, I have come to several places, 
even so soon, where I could only see one step ahead ; 
but as soon as I have taken that, another has been 
opened for me. That is all, I suppose, that is really 
necessary, though it isn’t very pleasant. So 1 am 
waiting and trusting and working just as hard as I 
can while the day lasts. Don’t make yourself un- 
happy nor let any of the rest do so. Why should you 
when He has said, “‘Seek first the kingdom of God 


62 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 
and ail things shall be added.” If our Father wants 


me to go through college, I know I shall go; and if 
He does n’t, I don’t want to. That is the end of it. 
Meanwhile I am planning and thinking. If it comes 
to anything, I will report. 

Now I must stop and get a lesson in rhetoric of 
thirty pages for to-morrow at eight o’clock. You see 
my life in these days is full. I try to do just as much 
every day as I would if it were my last in college. It 
isn’t long now before I shall see you, and you will 
see your tired child. 


Ann Arbor has been in uncontrollable excitement 
this week. ‘Thirty boys have been suspended for the 
remainder of the year, and one expelled. It is said 
to be a thing unheard-of in the history of American 
colleges. I send you only two of the numerous publi- 
cations on the affair. I never went through such a 
week in my life. You don’t know anything about 
it unless you are in the midst of it. ‘The senior and 
junior classes are aroused, and the whole body of 
students “‘bolted” chapel two mornings last week. 
At a great mecting a petition was sent to the Faculty, 
signed by sixty-five sophomores and seventy fresh- 
men, asking to be sent off too, as they were equally 
guilty. If there is a general suspension, the two 
classes will go in a body to Cornell. The boys who 
did n’t sign the petition have promised to go too. It 


THE UNIVERSITY 63 


fs the greatest shaking which the college has ever 
had. 


Small-pox is spreading dreadfully. It was taken 
from a subject in the dissecting room, and over 
thirty of the medical students have it. One died of 
it yesterday. As soon as cases break out they are 
taken to the pest-house, though some are too sick to 
be moved. A panic prevails and the citizens are 
trying to have the university closed. This certainly 
will not be done until after examination time, though 
possibly then if the disease continues to spread. A 
great many students have gone home, but I’m not: 
afraid. I should be more afraid to set off travelling 
now. 


I went to the Opera last week with Mr. W. I can’t 
describe it to you. It was all light and music and 
dancing, magnificent costumes and amazing trans- 
actions, very brilliant and graceful and beautiful. 
The house was crowded. I wore my blue suit, which, 
with my blue and white hat and white gloves, makes 
a pretty outfit for such an occasion. I enjoyed the 
evening exceedingly. But I found myself handed to 
my door at eleven o’clock with a nervous headache 
and a very tired body. It pays to go once, but it 
would n’t do for a University girl, with her head and 
hands more than full, to indulge in such exciting 
pleasures often. 


64 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I’m sorry I could n’t write you on Sunday, but I 
was very busy, had my hat off only once between 
church and bed-time, and that was when I ate my 
dinner. It was the first Sunday when it has n’t rained 
since I came from home. Church begins at half-past 
ten. Then comes my Bible class till two. At half-past 
two I go to the class in the Greek ‘Testament. On 
Sundays dinner is at three. After it F. and I went 
over to the cemetery, — as beautiful a place as you 
ean think of —so many trees there, as shady and still 
as a forest. I never saw so many squirrels, and they 
say it is full of birds in summer. I could spend a week 
there. Then the young people of the Presbyterian 
Church have a prayer-meeting at six o’clock, which I 
always attend, and preaching comes at seven. Of 
late there has been great interest in religion here. 
Our meetings are full. 

At my mission school there are about eighty 
scholars and only six or seven teachers. Several of 
these attend pretty irregularly. The children are 
mostly German, bright and interesting. The super- 
intendent is a senior in college. He told me this 
afternoon that he had given me the worst class in 
school, but he wanted me to try them. They have 
had a variety of teachers, who have n’t succeeded in 
keeping even decent order. Some of them are cer- 
tainly bold and bad looking. They are boys from 
ten to fifteen and are pretty nearly unmanageable. 


THE UNIVERSITY 65 


Well, it’s an experiment, and I suppose they will give 
me more than one problem this winter. I’m sure I 
had my hands full this afternoon. 


This is the first day of vacation. I have been so 
busy this year that it seems good to get a change, even 
though I do keep right on here at work. For some 
time I have been giving a young man lessons in Greek 
each Saturday. It has taken about all day, and with 
all my college work has kept me very busy. I have 
had two junior speeches already, and there are still 
more. Several girls from Flint tried to have me go 
home with them for the vacation, but I made up my 
mind to stay and do what I could for myself and the 
other people here. A young Mr. M. is going to 
recite to me every day in Virgil; so with teaching 
and all the rest I shan’t have time to be homesick, 
though it will seem rather lonely when the other 
girls are gone and I don’t hear the college bell for two 
weeks. 


My mission school is prosperous, though I found 
my class pretty badly demoralized by the vacation. 
It has been hard work pulling it into order again. 
Two missionaries from ‘Turkey are here, one a gradu- 
ate of this university. He spoke in the hall last night 
to an audience of two thousand. I met him yesterday 
wnd had a good deal of talk with him, and he was 


66 ALICH FREEMAN PALMER 


in all my recitations to-day. He says, ‘“ We want 
you, Miss Freeman, in Central Turkey; ”’ Professor 
D’Ooge adds, “* We want you in the United States.” 
They have finally concluded to leave it to me; and 
I don’t believe I’m wanted very badly anywhere. 


This week has been one of the saddest I have spent 
here, notwithstanding the fact that Miss S. is get- 
ting well. She is now so much better that there is lit- 
tle doubt of her entire recovery, and she will soon go 
home. I sat up all night with her Wednesday. The 
girls take turns in looking after her, which we shan’t 
need to do much longer. But death has come among 
us this week. Mr. C. of ’75 was one of my good 
friends. Last year he was elected President of our 
Lecture Association, the highest office of the senior 
class. Dr. Angell says he was the foremost man in 
his class. I came to know him in the Association, 
where he was very prominent. He was preparing 
for the ministry. A week ago he was at the prayer 
meeting and afterwards talked to me earnestly of his 
plans for next winter. He lives only a few miles from 
here and goes home every Saturday. As he started 
for home last week he remarked to a friend that he 
was not feeling quite well; and almost before we had 
missed him news came on Tuesday that he was dead. 
Brain fever did its work in three days, and carried 
off one of the noblest men I shall ever know. His 


THE UNIVERSITY 67 


class went in a body to the funeral and the entire 
university is completely shocked. 


Ottawa 


My first week here was hard. Of course there are 
many things to get used to, and so many strange 
names and faces to put together. But it will all grow 
easier after a time, and I have been feeling pretty 
well. I begin at nine in the morning and end at half- 
past four. Then I have my registers and class books 
to arrange, and so don’t go home until supper time. 
After that I have eight lessons to prepare for the next 
day, which, when I’m tired, costs some effort. Itry | 
to spend the entire evening on these; only I have had 
calls every evening so far, which takes time, you 
know. Friday nights I arrange the standing of each 
one and count the absences. If these amount to three 
half days, I send a note to the parents. Once a week 
we have essays, declamations, and select readings; 
and Saturday afternoons I have essays to criticise. 
Then I board three quarters of a mile from the 
school, and that takes time, but I like it. Saturday 
I got at my merino dress, put a new braid on, and 
sewed all the evening as hard as possible. I don’t 
know when I have improved every minute as I have 
been obliged to here. It is a very good thing. I had 
such an abominable habit of wasting time, and I’m 
likely to get cured. You must tell me all about our 


68 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


classes and what is doing each week. I get so hun- 
gry to hear it all. I just devoured your letter. Do 
tell me the little things. 


Yesterday an Irishman living in this street, while 
drunk, struck his wife with an ax, hitting her over 
the head, in fact pounded her almost to death. She 
was in terrible pain. A neighbor called the doctor, 
who was with her till she died just before noon; but 
he could do little for her. There’s no doubt that her 
husband killed her. What is worse, she herself drank 
almost as much as he, and was a very bad woman. 
There’s one little boy. Oh, L.! Don’t you wish we 
could stop this dreadful liquor selling? That’s where 
the blame lies. If I were a man, would n’t I do some- 
thing? Come to think of it, I should n’t wonder if I 
should as it is. 


Your letter came Wednesday in a terrible snow- 
storm, itself almost like a great snowflake, and made 
me want to go to you. For a while I felt as if I must 
put my arms about you and try to comfort you. But 
I could only come up here by myself and pray that 
the dear Christ, who loves and pities you, would give 
you peace and rest. After all, I am afraid that is all I 
can ever do. Perhaps it is the most any of us can do 
for each other, no matter what our love may be. But 
you are not “all alone.” Don’t ever say so. “ Lo, I 


THE UNIVERSITY 69 


am with you always, even unto the end.” I think of 
you so often this hard examination week, so much 
harder now when you are sick — body and soul. De 
be just as happy as you can, in any way you can. 
You have found that fighting yourself does no good, 
that in the unequal contest you are trying to crush 
what each day shows you is a part of your very soul. 
No! Shun everything that hurts you. Be good to 
yourself always and everywhere. You have n’t any 
too much strength. But if you carry your cross, you 
may obtain strength from it for the onward journey. 
So take it in and let it help and soothe you, even 

though you know it to be a dream. ; 


Such a dreadful thing has happened! A letter of 
two sheets came from Mr. W. this week; and oh, 
such a letter! It just takes my breath away, it hurts 
me so to think of it. Why, why is it that I seem 
doomed to the very thing I would most be delivered 
from? I never imagined it in him, did you? I must 
answer it to-day, and it does n’t seem as if I could. 
It is such a passionate letter, and I know he must 
be terribly in earnest to talk so. I tremble for the 
effect it will have on him just now. Do be kind to 
him, if you have any chance. And here is Mr. S. 
walking home from class with me every evening. I 
moved, you know, to get away for a little while from 
worry of this sort. And of course I don’t mean to say 


70 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


such an absurd thing as that he is really in danger. 
Only he is too kind. But I am getting suspicious of 
everybody who looks at me, unless I have been intro- 
duced to his wife. | 


I finished yesterday just half the weeks I have to 
teach, and the ten that are left will pass too quickly, 
doubtless, for the work which is to be done in them; 
but not when I think where the end of them will take 
me. Once in a while I dread going back to college. 
Not that it is n’t far pleasanter than teaching. But 
sometimes the world seems sick. I can’t help think- 
ing of what you told me of the secret societies. God 
help us all! He alone is able. Let us pray for the 
noble young men who are going down unless an arm 
mighty to save is quickly thrown around them. So 
S. has gone too! I liked the boy so much. Perhaps 
it is better for him. But what a loss to the class! 
Really in a year there won’t be much of a class left, 
at this rate. Oh, if we could only sit down and talk 
it all over! 


Mother, this being off alone, so out in the world, 
is tiresome; the more so because my life is crowded 
with work and care. But I am succeeding. ‘There 
was a meeting of the Board this week, and the Presi- 
dent afterwards informed me that “ they were all 
grateful to me for what I was doing for the school. 


THE UNIVERSITY 71 


And though from the first I had given them to under- 
stand that I was here only for the year, they begged 
me to reconsider the matter;”’ in short, telling me I 
must stay. I told him as politely as I knew how that 
I could n’t and should n’t, and they still insist. ‘They 
say I know enough now and can finish my studies 
by myself. Asif they knew! Well! I hope they won’t 
be disappointed before the year is out. 


V 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 


WHEN a young person leaves college, where for 
four years he has been supported while happily 
pursuing his own ends, and goes forth into an alien 
world which demands as its price for his living that 
he shall attend to its needs, the change is disturbing. 
In college the aims of culture and enjoyment are 
dominant; in the world outside there is the neces- 
sity of watching others’ wants; our own preferences 
drop a good deal out of sight. Accordingly it 1s of- 
ten said that a college unfits one for practical life. 
Though it gives the means of becoming broadly ser- 
viceable, it does not necessarily bring the desire, and 
certainly does not form the requisite habits. What we 
gain in college is apt enough to stick fast within us, 
and not easily to pass beyond. Before we can suc- 
ceed in the new and dutiful ways our aims need re- 
adjusting. For most persons there comes something 
of a jolt in turning from the period of acquisition 
to that of distribution. In Miss Freeman’s case this 
was less violent on account of her early training and 
the austere conditions which attended her college 
life. Yet even she found the years immediately after 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 73 


leaving college severe. From 1876 to 1881 she went 
through much exhausting drudgery: she was over- 
worked and underpaid, she was imperfectly fed, she 
had too little fresh air and amusement, she was bur- 
dened with family anxieties, and was sent hither 
and thither with little power to choose the place 
where she would be. The beginnings of professional 
life make little account of personal desires. The years 
1876-87, therefore, from graduation to her mar- 
riage, | group together as a third period of her career 
and call it her time of service. In her second period, 
from her entering Windsor Academy to her leaving | 
the University of Michigan, she was — though with 
many distractions — accumulating knowledge and 
properly serving her own ends. Now, what others 
require becomes her chief care, and she is mainly 
busied with expenditure. 

At Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, was a seminary for 
girls, whose ages ranged from twelve to twenty-five. 
Its head was a college acquaintance of Miss Free- 
man’s, and two of her classmates were engaged as 
teachers. She herself agreed to take charge of the 
Greek and Latin on a nominal salary of eight hun- 
dred dollars. Part of this was conditional on the 
success of the school; three hundred dollars was 
charged to the tuition of her sister Ella, who, hav- 
ing just become engaged, now needed good general 
training rather than a college course. The actual 


74 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


profits of the undertaking were therefore small. The 
summer had to be spent in preparing her sister and 
herself for the new work. In the midst of it the 
youngest sister, Stella, fell seriously ill, while the 
financial prospects of the family grew steadily darker. 
There was a gloom upon her when she went to Lake 
Geneva which increased the hardships of the early 
weeks there. She writes: — 

*“‘A month ago I took the severest cold I have had 
for years. It went to my lungs, and for some days 
made me decidedly sick. I am better now. But one 
does n’t get entire rest in teaching at a boarding 
school, even when one is well. I am far from that. 
You know I did n’t rest during the summer, and I 
have n’t rested for a good while. When I came here, 
weary and sad, I threw myself into my work; for I 
found many perplexities and difficulties. So long as 
my time was taken in working against these, I did not 
feel the weakness which crept over me after I began 
to see more ‘ open doors’ about and ahead of me. 
The work itself is n’t so very hard. I ought to grow 
strong in it. But I am not used to boarding school 
life. Being ‘ slave to a bell and vassal to an hour’ 
is irksome sometimes when my heart longs for other 
scenes and the friends from whose presence I have 
gone away. My roommate is a refined, talented, and 
pleasant person of thirty; and yet I would so much 
rather be alone. You ask if Iam happy. Let me be 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 75 


honest with you to-night. No, Iam not. But I am 
content, and that is better. I am at work, and before 
me stretch high aims and great tasks, more than 
enough to fill the years until I shall awake in His 
likeness and be satisfied.” 

But these were not Miss Freeman’s usual moods. 
The sense of human needs in the school soon engaged 
her, and a fair degree of health returned. Of the way 
in which her ideals of teaching were taking shape a 
good notion may be had from a letter written at this 
time to one of her friends, who was herself a teacher: 

“You ask how I work among the girls to gain 
influence. Let me talk to you a little about it. As. 
I lived among these young people day after day, I 
felt a want of something: not intellectual, or even 
religious, culture; not a lack of physical training or 
that acquaintance with social life which can be so 
charming in a true woman; but a something I must 
call heart culture, in lack of a better name. Every 
one was kind, but cold. There was no intentional 
freezing, but an absence of the sunshine which melts 
its own way. Looking on and into them, I said, I 
will try to be a friend to them all, and put all that is 
truest and sweetest, sunniest and strongest that I can 
gather into their lives. While I teach them solid 
knowledge, and give them real school drill as faith- 
fully as I may, I will give, too, all that the years have 
brought to my own soul. God help me to give what 


76 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


He gave — myself — and make that self worth some- 
thing to somebody; teach me to love all as He has 
loved, for the sake of the infinite possibilities locked 
up in every human soul. Consecrating myself to the 
future of these girls, to them as women, I have tried 
in this life among them to make them feel that they 
can always come to me in happy and in sad times, 
in restless moments, or homesick and tired hours. 
Whenever they want help or comfort, my door and 
heart shall be open. Not that I have said this. I 
have just felt it, and I think they feel it too. We 
kneel together every evening, and every morning at 
chapel service their faces look up into mine. Keeping 
my eyes open for chances, I find the rest takes care 
of itself — a word, a look even, the touch of a hand; 
and by and by, when the time comes, something more. 
I have to work very differently here from what was 
possible in Ann Arbor. A university town has food 
which you can’t give boarding-school girls, nor men 
and women of still less culture; and these make up 
the majority of a town like this, though we have 
some families as cultivated and wealthy as can be 
found anywhere. But Christianity meets the wants 
of every heart; only it takes experience, knowledge 
of and insight into human nature — but far more 
than anything else, the spirit of Christ himself — in 
order to know when and how to speak. Why, what 
is it to be a Christian, a Christ-follower, unless it 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 73 


is going about doing good? We ought to love every- 
body and make everybody love us. Then everything 
else is easy.” 

Such a teacher does not fail. Miss Freeman was 
pressed to continue another year. But the atmosphere 
of a private school was never quite congenial to her. 
Its little proprieties, its small interests, its narrow 
intellectual horizon, were matters distasteful to her 
free soul, and yet she was powerless to change them. 
If she were to teach the following year, she preferred 
to do so ina public school, where there would be both 
boys and girls. But dreams of wider scope were run- 
ning in her head. Throughout her college course she ~ 
had hoped for a period of graduate study; and she 
felt this especially important in view of the interrup- 
tion of her junior year. She longed to repair that 
loss, as well as the damage done by the crowded 
freshman time. In the early seventies, too, the degree 
of Doctor of Philosophy was just beginning to assert 
its haughty claims, and was felt doubly desirable by 
those who had little opportunity for undergraduate 
electives. History was her favorite study. It dealt 
with persons. Her imagination illuminated it and 
she followed with enthusiasm its vast moral evolu- 
tions. Then, too, always and everywhere she loved 
a fact. Foreseeing that most of her solid years must 
be given to teaching, she seems to have formed some 
project of devoting summer vacations, and later per 


78 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


haps a single entire year, to advanced study. Imme- 
diately on leaving Lake Geneva she accordingly 
began work on an historical subject at Ann Arbor. 
J find the following memorandum in her hand: 
“ June-Sept., 1877. Spent the summer in Ann Arbor 
studying for a higher degree. Did not return for ex- 
aminations the following year on account of Stella’s 
illness. Was offered an instructorship in mathemat- 
ics at Wellesley College, but declined.’ The plan of 
advanced study was never abandoned. From time 
to time, as other toils permitted, it was resumed; 
and though her thesis was never completed, in 1882 
the university conferred on her the degree of Ph.D. 
As the official head of education in that state, the 
University of Michigan interests itself in the welfare 
of all its high schools. One of these at Saginaw, in 
Northern Michigan, had fallen into decay. Its prin- 
cipal, a man of loveable character, was incapable of 
keeping order. The scholarship of the school had 
therefore for some time been declining until, though 
it still had several hundred pupils, it was of diminish- 
ing value to the university and the town. The super- 
intendent of schools consulted President Angell. He 
advised that the kindly principal be nominally 
retained, but that Miss Freeman be appointed pre- 
ceptress and left to smooth out the difficulties of the 
situation in whatever way her tact could devise. 
Thither she accordingly went in September, 1877; 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 79 


and a month later, on the resignation of another 
teacher, she secured a position for her sister Ella as 
the head of a neighboring grammar school. The 
contest for authority in her own school was at first 
sharp. The leader of the organized turbulence was 
a young man of about her own years; for she was only 
twenty-two, slight, and in feeble health. Within a 
week she had turned him out of school and did not 
readmit him until he had made public apology. 
Within two months all friction had disappeared, the 
standard of scholarship was raised, teachers and 
pupils were alike friendly. She had won regard from _ 
the people of Saginaw, and at the end of the year a 
hundred dollars of additional salary was gratuitously 
voted her. I have talked with pupils of that school, 
who cannot comprehend how anything less than 
magic could in a few weeks have changed so rude 
a company as themselves into sweet-natured and 
diligent students. 

But this time of sunny peacemaking was a season 
of anguish for herself. ‘The health of her sister in 
New York still failed. Stella, the youngest of the 
family, was regarded by all as its choicest member. 
Mer starry beauty was remarked everywhere. She 
wrote delightfully in prose and verse, was a capital 
story-teller, witty, studious, high-minded, less stormy 
in temper than Alice, and up to her fifteenth year 
apparently in vigorous health. Then the family 


80 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


weakness showed itself. An attack of fever settled 
in her lungs and could not be dislodged. Alice nursed 
her through the first summer vacation after she left 
college, and expected the trouble to disappear. It 
did not, however; consumption declared itself, and 
for two years fears and hopes chased one another 
perplexingly. In the autumn of 1877 doctors pro- 
nounced the illness dangerous, and began to talk of 
a change of climate. All these distresses, too, were 
complicated with financial troubles. ‘The lumber en- 
tanglement, which I have mentioned before as drag- 
ging the family down, had gone from bad to worse, 
until Dr. Freeman believed he could best protect his 
creditors by giving up to them his home and all his 
property. This occurred in November, 1877, just as 
Alice and Ella had begun their teaching in Saginaw. 

The two girls speedily set about plans of relief. 
Their joint salaries amounted to eleven hundred dol- 
lars, and there were hopes of increasing this a little 
by private pupils. ‘They hired and furnished a house, 
and at Christmas had the entire family settled in 
Saginaw. ‘The expenses of a loved invalid are always 
heavy, and it was not easy to meet them in the midst 
of school problems. But the father soon began prac- 
tice as a physician, the mother took a teacher or two 
to board, and the son found a place in a store. All 
had brave hearts. Throughout the winter the family 
was happy in one another and in a common care. 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 81 


By summer Stella was so much revived that Ella was 
able to marry, and the brother to enter the Medical 
School of the University of Michigan. But as the 
second winter approached, the fair prospects dark- 
ened; and Alice, who had been called to Wellesley 
again in December, 1878, —- this time in Greek, — 
felt that she must once more decline. The beautiful 
sufferer lingered till Spring, but died on June 20, 1879, 
at the age of eighteen. No other grief of Mrs. 
Palmer’s life equalled this. Stella was five years 
younger than she and had been much in her charge. 
She loved her as her own child and also as one 
whom she thought superior to herself. She dreamed — 
of one day sending her to college, and of their becom- 
ing ultimately associated in some common work. 
No death had hitherto come near her, and this one 
made all which subsequently came seem slight. As 
she herself lay dying, I heard her murmur Stella’s 
name. 

It was well to leave Saginaw now. A change of 
surroundings was equally necessary for health and 
for work. Dr. Freeman’s practice, too, was increas- 
ing, and the family was once more on its feet. Her 
brother had been sent to college; her surviving sister 
was married and gone to her own home. On herself 
a third call to Wellesley was pressed, a call of a 
higher kind than before. She had been in corre- 
spondence about it for several months, putting the 


82 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


proposal aside at first because she would not leave 
her sister. By that sister’s death she was sorrowfully 
set free. In July, 1879, when she was twenty-four, 
she became the head of the department of history at 
Wellesley College. 

I suppose I must give a few poignant glimpses into 
the two years’ life in Saginaw, years which began 
in gladness and ran into continually deeper tragedy. 
Without them Miss Freeman cannot be known. 
She was a hardened optimist, and because of her 
cheerful courage she appeared to many like a 
favorite of fortune on whom good things regularly 
fell. Fortunate indeed she was, but chiefly in her 
power of discovering a soul of good in things evil. 
Hope in her view is — 


The paramount duty that Heaven lays 
For its own honor on man’s suffering heart. 


Yet I must let it be seen that she had her full share 
of hardships and was abundantly acquainted with 
grief. Moods of despondency came to her as truly 
as to others, and she did not hesitate to express them. 
I have purposely included several such utterances 
among her letters. But she was not absorbed or 
misled by them. She went straight on. General 
Grant remarks, in his “‘ Memoirs,”’ that all soldiers 
are frightened about equally on going into battle, 
but that there is a mighty difference in the way they 
behave under fear. She had a sensitive heart and 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 83 


to feel her humanity we must see it quiver. But she 
put her mind elsewhere than in her moods, and 
these soon took their suitable place. To duty she 
gave herself gladly, counting it the voice of a friend, 
,and in its exhilarating companionship she found a 
“way through even physical ills. Her “radiance” 
was therefore no product of ignorance, but of a 
deeper insight into things human and divine. She 
often quoted some lines of Emerson’s which well 
describe her own mode of meeting good and ill; 
only she understood them as expressing no mere 
Stoicism but the Christian’s joyous acceptance of a 

complex and hallowed world: — | 


Let me go where’er I will, 

I hear a sky-born music still. 

It sounds from all things old, 

It sounds from all things young 3 
From all that’s fair, from all that’s foul, 
Peals out a cheerful song. 

It is not only in the rose, 

It is not only in the bird, 

Not only where the rainbow glows, 
Nor in the song of woman heard ; 
But in the darkest, meanest things, 
There alway, alway, something sings. 


LETTERS 
Across the table sits my queenly sister, reading 4 
letter with flushing cheeks. She came a week ago 
to take a position which the superintencent obtained 


84 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


for her in a grammar school. Is n’t everybody kind 
to me? And we have had such talks about those at 
home whom I have n’t seen in so long. Our room is 
bright and cozy, and we hope to have a happy year. 
Just now my hands are so full of monthly examina- 
tions and reports that my usual labors in mathematics 
and the sciences seem too trivial to mention. 


How sunny and restful your letter sounds to-day, 
when I am so tired. Friday night my school closes 
for two weeks. ‘Chat evening my father, mother, 
and Stella arrive. The week after, the State Teachers’ 
Association meets here for three days. During those 
days and in the mean time I shall be driven with 
work, as I have five classes which will be examined 
for the benefit of these visitors. ‘Then in the vacation 
I must get my family settled. I have already rented 
a house, but probably it will be no light matter to 
put it in order for the winter. 

To you I don’t mind explaining what would other- 
wise seem a little mysterious in our arrangements. 
Two months ago Papa made an assignment of every- 
thing to his creditors. When this business was over, 
it seemed best that there should be an immediate 
change. One of Papa’s lungs has failed, and Stella 
is no better. So I am to have them here with me. 
Fred will come soon. I am very anxious that he 


should enter the Medical School next fall. And 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 85 


Ella must have next year for study and rest, as she 
will undoubtedly be married the year after. 

Forgive me, then, for having written so little. I 
have been in constant communication with the 
assignee and have had much to do for Ella. My 
duties, too, at the school are so numerous that I go 
every morning at eight o’clock and for the last two 
weeks have remained until dark. It has been damp, 
and I have not felt very well. But won’t it be pleasant 
for us to be together again at Christmas? The first 
time I have seen the family in the winter since 1871. 
Please say nothing about these perplexities of mine. 
I don’t want anybody to think a troubled thought — 
of me. I really don’t need such thoughts. I can see 
a little way ahead now, and am quite willing to trust 
and work. 


The spring-time is without and within. It has 
come early this year, and how beautiful! Yesterday 
Ella and Stella and I went out walking as the sun 
was rising. ‘The air seems like April’s, and the sun- 
shine like June’s, while here and there a bird sings 
cheerily from branches just swelling and reddening. 
We walked about three miles, and came home 
perfectly ravenous. 

You see by this how much better Stella is. Since 
coming here she has greatly improved, indeed is 
better now than she has been since last summer. 


86 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Next term she is going to study, if she continues so 
strong. She plans to go to the school each morning 
for practice in writing. I am still doubtful about it. 
But she is so restless, she must try at any rate. ‘This 
morning we all went to church together, for the first 
time in so long that it seems like going away back 
or away onward, I hardly know which. 


It is only a fortnight since our wedding and you 
are looking forward to your own. Naturally I have 
been thinking a good deal about the two. I wish we 
could have the whole afternoon for a talk. But do 
keep happy, and grow wise in keeping another happy. 
Be unselfish, dear, and learn to contro] the woman’s 
restless hunger. Let it only make you more sympa- 
thetic and strong. Sympathy is the great want of 
the human heart, man’s heart as well as woman’s. 
You must teach him how to sympathize in the broad 
sense with you, and to let you sympathize with him, 
in little as well as great things. Then you will feel 
always that you are bound up together, that every- 
thing you each do is full of the other. That, I think, 
must be being married; and that, you know, is n’t 
the work of an hour, or a year. Then, no matter what 
comes, you can never be really separated. Shake 
speare understood this when he wrote his sonnets. 


All this week my thoughts have been following 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 87 


you, this busy week of organizing our high school. 
I want you here, these white still nights. Last night 
I sat till late, looking out into the beauty of the 
moonlight and thinking of friends. I was going over 
the years that are past and wondered why so many 
things, buried long ago with the dead years, rise up 
and sit down beside me in the silence. There are 
days when every air blows from a distance. This 
house is haunted nowadays. Sometimes I long for 
one of those moments that are gone more than for all 
that the days to come hold in their close-shut hands. 


I am hungry to hear from you. I seem so shut-in © 
this year. Home and school life keep me so occupied 
that I have hardly been able to give a moment to 
anything outside, except when too tired to do any- 
thing but think. These times have come oftener than 
they used to. Just now I am oppressed with the 
passing days. Do you know, lately I have come to 
want to paint flowers and all sorts of lovely things, 
to sketch faces that are pleasant to me. You have 
genius for this. I should have to learn. Had I better 
try? I do so want to be putting bright bits of beauty 
into and out of my life. Stella is having a high fever 
this afternoon. I must go to her. 


Sometimes in these days it seems as if the solid 
earth were giving way under my feet, as if all my 


88 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


present and future were slipping out of my control. 
And then I turn instinctively to my past. I suppose 
that is what God gives us a past for, to stand on. We 
are sure now that we can keep Stella only a little 
while. The fight has been so long we hardly know 
how to give it up. But we cannot expect her to endure 
through the summer. She grows whiter and weaker 
every day, suffering intensely. Our light is dying 
out. Pray the good God to lighten and warm this 
dark home, where we watch her going farther away 
from our helpless help. 


These days are solemnly sweet. I make no plans 
in them. Recently I have written Mr. Durant about 
the state of things here, but have not had his reply. 
You see it is extremely doubtful whether I go to 
Wellesley. Nothing is clear before me now. I am 
very tired. The year has worn upon me, in school 
and at home. But I think I shall come through with- 
out breaking down. If I do go to Wellesley, I have 
promised Mr. Durant to go at the earliest moment. 
He wants me to do some studying there, and has 
been urging me to resign here. The position certainly 
requires much preparation, and I must consult about 
methods and books. 


School ended last week; and though my work is 
not quite finished, vacation is begun. I am not alto- 


SCHOOL-TEACHING 89 


gether well — nothing serious, only too tired to sleep, 
and sometimes too heartsick to want to rest. I am 
going to leave Saginaw just as soon as I can get 
ready, next week I think. Before going to Wellesley 
I shall spend a few days in Windsor. I have n’t been 
there in three years, and must stay a little with those 
who knew us when we were children. It will do me 
good to rest in the old places among the hills. But 
I go soon to Wellesley, because I must see what books 
are in the library there. I have to arrange my topics 
and make my references, as the classes use no text- 
books. Forgive me for not writing you more. The 
silence of death has fallen upon my life. It is a very — 
quiet time within, but O Lucy, Lucy! — Well dear, 
good-by. Send me a letter out of your beautiful life 
as soon as you can. Kiss me, Lucy, and hold me 
close to keep my heart from breaking. 


Vi 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 


WELLESLEY COLLEGE, to which Miss Freeman 
went in 1879, and with which she was connected for 
the next eight years, was opened in 1875 by Henry 
Fowle Durant. He had graduated at Harvard Col- 
lege in 1841, entered the law in Boston, and soon 
won eminence and a fortune by his masterly conduct 
of difficult cases in the courts. Slight in stature and 
imperious in will, he took pleasure in contest and 
easily made strong friends and strong enemies. 
There was about him great personal charm. He had 
read much, had an excellent library, wrote with 
refinement in prose and verse, and was something 
of a connoisseur in the arts. Near the close of his 
brilliant and contentious life he lost a son of remark- 
able promise. The shock turned his attention to 
religious matters. Into these he threw himself with 
his customary ardor, retiring from the law. To rid 
himself of self-seeking and to make his property and 
his remaining years a benefit to his fellow men became 
his passion. These purposes were warmly seconded 
by his wife. It was their belief that a community 
could be helped most by education, and they deter- 


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TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 91 


mined to express their affection for their son by 
founding a college. On examining the provision for 
education already made in our Eastern States, they 
concluded that women were in greater need than men. 
Vassar had just been opened and was the only con- 
siderable college for girls, though of colleges from 
which women were excluded New England had more 
than a dozen. By enlarging the opportunities for 
women Mr. and Mrs. Durant thought they could 
best accomplish their generous purpose. Their home 
was at Wellesley, fifteen miles west of Boston, where 
they had an estate of more than three hundred acres, 
made up of plains, hills, woods, and the shores of — 
Lake Waban. This they now deeded to trustees as 
the site of the new college, — Mr. Durant directing, 
however, that neither it nor any of its buildings 
should be called by his name, nor should any portrait 
of himself be hung within its walls. 

It will be seen that there was religious ardor in the 
founding of Wellesley, and a spirit of sacrifice, quali- 
ties without which few endowments undertaken for 
the public good prove permanently strong. At the 
beginning the fervor of a young convert may have 
led Mr. Durant to give undue prominence to the 
conscious religious motive; but he kept all doors 
open for the extensive changes which time has proved 
wise, and in his holiest injunctions there was great 
sagacity. The college was to be Christian, but no 


92 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


sect was to have a majority of its trustees. All its 
officials were to be devout persons, but not bound 
by any form of subscription. With clear under- 
standing of the native tendencies of womanhood, the 
motto, ‘‘ Not to be ministered unto but to minister ” 
was selected for the college seal. Morning and even- 
ing there were twenty-minute periods of “ Silent 
Time,” when each girl must be alone in her room, and 
devotions would be natural, though not enforced. Re- 
quired prayers twice a day were led by the teachers, 
Sunday services by invited ministers, and there were 
daily Bible classes. From among the professors 
advisers were appointed for each class, who kept 
regular office hours and were accessible for consulta- 
tion on any subject. It must be remembered that 
in those days parents were little inclined to separate 
their daughters from family influence, and that many 
features of the home had to be provided if girls were 
to be drawn to the higher education. 

_ It is to Mr. Duranit’s credit that at a time when 
such things were less regarded than at present he laid 
great stress on the beauty of surroundings, spending 
much on his grounds, on paintings and photographs, 
on music, on whatever might ennoble the young 
through unconscious influence. And while he very 
properly sought to develop Christian character in his 
college, it was not his purpose to substitute this for 
intellectual discipline. Determined that the stand- 





TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 93 


ard of scholarship should ultimately be the highest, 
he attached little weight to text-books, made gener- 
ous provision for laboratories and library, and 
favored methods of teaching which were quite in 
advance of his time. Of course such purposes could 
not be realized at once. In every beginning there 1s 
chaos. He was himself but slenderly acquainted with 
educational matters, and there were few highly 
trained women to form his faculty. Women he pre- 
ferred as professors, because hitherto they had not 
been allowed to teach in colleges; and girls were 
little likely to become students if told that there was 
something in their sex which debarred them from — 
high scientific standing. 

It was to a college thus nobly conceived that Alice 
Freeman came, a college for which all her previous 
training had prepared her and which was planned 
to embody most of her own ideals. Yet perhaps it is 
not unfair to say that, while Mr. Durant was its 
founder, she in her brief term was its builder. The 
ideas were his; but they were hers too, and they 
waited for her to disclose the modes of so applying 
them as to give them power over the future. Had the 
aim of the college been simply scholastic, she might 
have been stifled. Had it been careless of scholar- 
ship, she would not have remained. But seeking as 
it did to fashion beautiful women, she identified her- 
self with it enthusiastically, in herself embodied its 


94 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER’ 


type, and by degrees constructed a Wellesley spirit 
in which helpfulness, modesty, intelligence, and 
grace are recognized ingredients. 

The attention of Mr. Durant was first drawn to her 
by President Angell. Of the circumstances he gives 
the following account, not knowing apparently how 
long the negotiations were in progress, and probably 
fixing the date a year later than it really was: — 

“When Mr. Durant founded Wellesley College 
so few women had received college education that he 
experienced some difficulty in finding suitable candi- 
dates for the professorial chairs. On my recom- 
mendation he appointed three or four Michigan 
graduates, who proved so satisfactory that he wrote 
to me to inform him at any time when we graduated 
such a woman as I thought he ought to appoint. It 
so happened that I had occasion, I think in the year 
1879, to visit the high school in East Saginaw, of 
which Miss Freeman was then principal. I attended 
a class in English Literature which she was teaching. 
The class was composed of boys of from fifteen to 
eighteen years of age, in whom one would perhaps 
hardly expect much enthusiasm for the great masters 
of English literature. But it was soon apparent that 
she had those boys, as she always had her classes, 
completely under her control and largely filled with 
her own enthusiasm. They showed that at their 


homes they had been carefully and lovingly reading 


Shor ol a 


~ 
et Bree a a ee oh a es er 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 95 


some of the great masterpieces and were ready to 
discuss them with intelligence and zest. I have never 
witnessed finer work of the kind with a class of that 
sort. When I returned home, I wrote to Mr. Durant 
that he must appoint the woman whose remarkable 
work I had been witnessing, that he could not afford 
to let her slip out of his hand. Whether my letter led 
to his decision to call her to Wellesley I do not know. 
But he did call her, and she went. The rest is matter 
of history.” 

Of her success as a teacher it is hardly necessary 
to speak. The interest which she aroused in history | 
is well known. She gave it a freshness and vitality 
which have become traditional at Wellesley, and so 
organized her department that it has remained one 
of the most influential in the college. But where the 
time was found for study and planning I cannot dis- 
cover. She must have lived at a killing pace. From 
her note-books I find that her regular work con- 
sisted of fifteen hours a week of history, a daily Bible 
class, charge of a portion of the domestic work, 
office hours each day as adviser to the senior class, 
and the oversight of her assistant in history. To this 
she added once a week throughout the winter a pub- 
lic lecture on some historical subject. All this work, 
too, was carried on in the grief and bodily weakness 
caused by her sister’s death. In the same note-books 
I find the following fragmentary entries: — 


96 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


“ Jan. 8. Faculty meeting after Chapel. A lovely 
day. I walked to the village and was out of doors an 
hour. Wrote letters and corrected examination 
papers. Spent an hour or more over new books on 
the Bible. It’s so hard to do neglected work! — 
Jan. 10. Enthusiastic sections this morning, and his- 
tory classes this afternoon unusually good. Fanny W. 
went to French table and Mary P. took her place at 
mine. I am going to have the girls change their seats 
once a week. Read German with my reading circle. 
— Jan. 13. Everything has gone wrong to-day. My 
Roman history did not do well this morning. Worked 
in the Library on references. Could not get exercise, 
but had a little sleep this afternoon. Must improve 
at once in health and work. — Jan. 19. A beautiful 
day, but full of disappointments and downright 
badness. When shall I conquer my besetting sins? 
Wasted the evening with Emily, Marion, Helen, and 
Jane.” 

Evidently too much work had been assigned her, 
an error perhaps inevitable in the early years of a 
college. Mr. Durant’s fortune was limited, while the 
demands upon it were not. Out of his own pocket 
he met whatever bills were in excess of the income 
from tuition, and this was fixed at a low figure. For 
many years, until other donors could be found, there 
was hard work and small pay. ‘Then too the practice 
of attending not only to the studies of students, but 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 07 


also to their character and manners is, as the Eng- 
lish universities have learned, a time-taking business. 
An enormous amount of Miss Freeman’s time was 
spent in interviews with girls, interviews often of 
lifelong benefit to the girl herself and certainly the 
most efficient means of creating an understanding 
of what the college should be; but more than anything 
else these ate up her time and strength. We now 
know that not much administrative work can safely 
be put on a teacher. But this was not so well under- 
stood at that time, and it is not strange that one who 
had aptitudes in both directions should have been 
overstrained. | 
In its initial steps an undertaking usually requires 
a single strong hand. Mr. Durant was naturally 
autocratic, and during the few years of his life he 
ruled Wellesley absolutely, within and without. He 
had, it is true, appointed Miss Ada L. Howard pres- 
ident; but her duties as an executive officer were 
rather nominal than real; neither his disposition, her 
health, nor her previous training allowing her much 
power. Even the Board of Trustees exercised little 
real control. Mr. Durant held all the authority, and 
his keen eye early discovered the force of Miss 
Freeman. In her first year he said to one of the 
trustees, “ You see that little dark-eyed girl? She 
will be the next president of Wellesley.” ‘Though 
frequently they did not agree, her independence did 


98 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


not alienate him, but appeared to make him trust 
her the more. He loved the strong. Often he sought 
her out, talked with her on historical and literary 
matters, explored her ideas of teaching, and bore 
from her opposition which others feared to give. 
The prophecy of her future rise which I have just 
quoted was made shortly after the following clash. 

Mr. Durant had called her attention to a member 
of the senior class as one “who was not a Chris- 
tian,” and directed Miss Freeman to go and talk with 
her “ about her soul.”” He was a man already past 
fifty, accustomed to be obeyed, and she a girl of 
twenty-four; but she flatly refused. He demanded 
her reasons. She explained how disrespectful such 
direct assaults on one’s personality are, and how 
generally ineffective. She said that to do such a 
thing would be contrary to her whole mode of inter- 
course with students and might well shake their con- 
fidence in her. In short, she would not do it. He in- 
sisted, and for a time she feared the resistance would 
cost her her place. But after the painful affair was 
over he never referred to it again, except by treating 
her with ever-increasing trust. On her side, too, 
admiration for Mr. Durant held firm through all 
their differences, and ceased only with her life. 

Yet this incident will indicate some of the per- 
plexities which filled the early years when, under 
its masterful leader, the hastily gathered college was 





TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 99 


learning to organize itself. Such things cost blood. 
So did the immense load of her teaching. So did the 
penetrating personal influence of which she was so 
lavish. So did her longing for her dead sister. So did 
the efforts she was making to help her brother 
through college. Such a person confines herself to no 
single care, nor accepts ease when exhaustion requires 
it; but, hiding her inner bleedings from herself as 
well as from others, carries for their sake a group of 
interwoven anxieties. 

Such at least was Miss Freeman’s prodigality at 
this time. Later she learned, though she always 
found it difficult, a larger generosity. Never sturdy, 
she came to Wellesley in broken health and had no 
time to repair it. The cough which she took from 
Windsor to Ann Arbor grew constantly more racking, 
until in February, 1880, a hemorrhage of the lungs 
occurred. It was the busiest time of the year, and 
she at first persuaded Dr. Bowditch to let her con- 
tinue work until the spring recess. But on fuller 
examination he ordered her off at once, advising 
Southern France, and saying that probably she had 
but six months to live. She turned to Windsor, and 
on the way through New York consulted Dr. Willard 
Parker. I find a note in which she has recorded, “‘ Dr. 
Parker tells me I can live if I have character and 
courage enough.” He made her feel the recklessness 
of ways of living which she had previously thought 


100 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


necessary ; he sent her to the open air, to exercises in 
breathing, to hygiene, food, and care. She went to 
the old farm and took herself resolutely in hand. 
By isolation, energy, and healthful surroundings, 
she refitted herself so that she was able to return to 
Wellesley in April, after the spring recess, and to 
carry her full work until the end of the term. The 
summer brought further invigoration. Thus at the 
very outset of her career she was seemingly crippled ; 
but accepting the disaster in her usual optimistic 
way, she drew from it such knowledge of the laws of 
health as turned her into a vigorous woman. When 
she was examined eight years later the lesion had 
entirely disappeared, nor did it ever return. 

But the unorganized conditions at Wellesley 
proved dangerous to others beside herself. Mr. 
Durant was slowly sinking throughout 1880 and 
18381, and in October of the latter year he died. 
About the same time Miss Howard’s feeble health 
altogether gave way and compelled her to resign. 
A meeting of the Trustees was held on November 15, 
and Miss Freeman was appointed vice-president, 
but acting president for the year. ‘Though she was 
the youngest professor then in service, and so far as 
I can learn the youngest that has ever been ap- 
pointed there, she had already so proved her power 
that the judgment of the Faculty went with that of 
the Trustees. Being unwilling to withdraw altogether 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 101 


from her courses in history, she continued a portion 
of her teaching for a time, but also entered imme- 
diately on her executive work. 

When the surprising election was communicated 
to Miss Freeman, only a few hours could be allowed 
her for deliberation. The following account of how 
she spent those hours is furnished by a former 
Wellesley teacher and confirmed from an indepen- 
dent source: “ When the question of accepting the 
presidency was presented to her for immediate deci- 
sion, she took her horse and drove away quite alone 
over quiet country roads, so deep in thought that 
she noticed nothing about her until she found herself 
miles away, somewhere beyond South Framingham. 
When most young women would have consumed the 
time in asking advice of older persons whose expe- 
rience would have been of little service, she, like 
St. Paul, conferred not with flesh and blood, but 
sought the solitary place and communed with her 
own soul.” 

I have already shown the necessarily disturbed 
condition of the college in these early years. There 
were now fears of trouble from the more than usually 
animated senior class. ‘They had intimations of the 
election almost as soon as Miss Freeman learned it 
herself, and were much elated over the prospect of 
being ruled by a president but little older than them- 
selves. When Miss Freeman returned to her rooms, 


102 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


she sent for this class. They came in a body, filling 
with their merry presence all her chairs, tables, and 
floor. She told them she had called them together 
because she needed their advice. She had been asked 
that day to become acting president of Wellesley. 
She was too young for the office. Indeed, its duties 
were too heavy for any one. If she must meet them 
alone, she would have to decline. But it had occurred 
to her that perhaps they would be willing to take part 
with her, looking after the order of the college them- 
selves, and leaving her free for general administra- 
tion. If they were ready to undertake this, she 
thought she might accept. Of course the response 
was hearty. They voted themselves her assistants 
on the spot, and difficult indeed it was for any mem- 
ber of the three lower classes to stray from the 
straight path that year. I once asked Mrs. Palmer 
how she managed to survive the severities of a first 
presidential year, and she answered that she could 
not have done it if she had not had the help of the 
seniors. Of the instantaneous resourcefulness which 
secured her that help she said nothing. This I have 
learned since her death from a member of the class. 


LETTERS 


Clara D. has just been in my room, all excited 
over Jacob and Esau. “Jacob was such a selfish 
wretch to steal that birthright.’ She delights in get- 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 103 


ting herself wrought up, and I decidedly disapprove 
it. She tires her friends, and I am careful not to let 
her draw upon my strength unduly. In fact it is my 
principle here not to be intimate with any of the 
girls or to let them waste much of my time. Unless 
you are careful in this great family, all your time 
goes uselessly. You accomplish nothing. I think 
Mr. Durant expects his teachers to give themselves 
boundlessly to the girls; but I can’t do that this 
year even if I don’t “‘make them adore me,” as he 
says I must. It is a good thing for my health to be 
unpopular enough to be let alone, and I shan’t try 
to be anything else. What do you think of that? 


I don’t know what to do about a watch. Our reci- 
tations are partly lectures, partly notes, and partly 
questions. So I must have some guide in time, and 
none is provided here. Fifty dollars will get me as 
good a one as I shall ever need. But I am not paid 
until October. Perhaps I can get along until then. 
Only there are F.’s college expenses. Mother, could 
you meet those bills at present and let me send the 
money later? 


Nobody is so much what she ought to be as a good 
girl, if only people would let her alone. One of the 
freshmen has just left me after an hour of eager talk. 
She has a wonderfully bright, attractive mind, sensi- 


104 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


tive but timid, afraid lest her “‘sins are too stultifying 
to leave enough soul to be worth saving.”” How I like 
to talk of these things with such girls, so honest and 
simple, so unwilling to run any risk of shirking duty 
or failing of the truth! If we could only trust God 
and lead natural, simple lives! This child’s mind is 
full of what men — Presbyterians of Albany — have 
been telling her about God’s ways, and therefore of 
much that is both unreasonable and hopeless. But we 
have had a good hour, and she sees that a religious 
life does n’t consist in feeling either great sorrow for 
sin or great exaltation and rapture over forgiveness. 
How patient God is with us all! I wonder at it more 
and more, when he has so much to tell, and we such 
slowness in understanding. 


I have just sent the girls out of my room, telling 
tem they must give me a chance to write a birthday 
letter to my father. The truth is, an individual girl 
is a lovely and bewitching creature, but five hundred 
come to be a trifle — just a trifle — tiresome once in 
a long time. As old age comes on, I am afraid I shall 
grow homesick. Certainly I have never wished so 
much to be at home as this last year. Don’t you 
think it would be nice to settle down somewhere and 
enjoy life awhile? When shall we begin? When 
Christmas comes I am going home. I really can’t 
stay away longer. But remember I am very well 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 105 


this year, and all things here seem harmonious and 
prosperous. God keep them so! 


It is “‘Silent Time,” and all the house is still. I 
will write to you instead of reading my Bible. I have 
just come from one of the little talks I am giving on 
Fridays. For two evenings my recitation room has 
been so crowded that the girls have stood in the cor- 
ridor as far as they could hear. Now they have asked 
me to go up to the large lecture room. This talk 
about my “‘lectures”? makes me feel cheap. But 
to-night I promised to go there for the next time. I 
was speaking on Dante, and several of the teachers — 
came. Next week the subject is Savonarola. We are 
arousing some interest in history. There’s need 
enough. You can’t think how discouraged I some- 
times am. 


I am spending these holidays at home and find 
them like a pleasant dream, full of little house-talks, 
of neighbors dropping in, of rides and drives and 
long walks, and here and there a touch of business. 
One morning was taken up by a gentleman who 
insisted on my writing an English history! He will 
give me two years to doit. The publishers will make 
any terms I may name. A bright little woman has a 
book that she wishes me “‘to edit in order to insure 
its sale.” What a queer world it is! And the same 


106 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


day good Mrs. O. comes to get me to drive six miles 
to her Industrial School. But a college friend is also 
here for the day, and he gives her five dollars for her 
school in order to have my company for the afternoon. 
She seems pleased, he satisfied, and my family dis- 
cover how much half a day of my presence is worth. 


Your letter finds me in the hospital, where I am 
shut in with the sunshine, and going to make a care- 
ful study of my health. Last Saturday, after an 
unusually busy week, I found myself exhausted. I 
am ashamed of being so tired. So I came down 
here to rest. The breath of Spring is all about me as 
I write, for the room is full of flowers sent by my 
“rosebud garden of girls”! Their constant thought- 
fulness sweetens life at every step, and I feel rich in 
their love, whether it chances to find expression in 
roses and lilies or not. 

And you want me to be with you? Well, I will be 
somewhere, some when, somehow. Only it can’t be 
this vacation. But you are simply an old splendid to 
ask me. Give me advice about a new suit. I saw in 
Boston a dress of almost invisible green. It occurred 
to me it would be pretty for spring and fall days, 
with a bonnet of the same, brightened with a dash 
of color. One could wear with it creamy tea roses, 
or apple blossoms, or scarlet poppies in the fall. 
Kate says, “Your hair and eyes are just the same 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 107 


color. Get a dress to match.” Annie thinks dark 
brown or deep wine color would be better. Now 
what do you, my artist, advise? 

But I must stop. Annie will fill up the envelope. 
It makes me cough to write. I had a slight hem- 
orrhage last week, and so must rest. Everybody 
—especially Mr. Durant and Miss Howard — is 
angelic. Mr. D. came and talked with me a long 
time on Thursday. He said, “‘ You shall have two 
assistants next year. I'll do anything in the world 
if you'll only get well, Miss Freeman.” 


Since I found myself in the novel condition of | 
being really ill two months ago, I have been in great 
doubt much of the time about what I ought to do. 
I need rest and quiet more than anything else. I have 
given up much of my extra work, and still have kept 
as much as possible. During these few days of plea- 
sant weather I have grown better rapidly. 

Dr. Bowditch, the authority on lung diseases in 
Boston, whom I consulted last week, told me that 
with great caution 1 might remain here awhile, un- 
less I grow worse. It is very bad for the college and 
for me to give up now, unless continuing the respon- 
sibility is entirely unsafe. So I conclude to wait until 
the spring vacation. If then I do not feel equal to 
the next term’s work, they offer leave of absence 
until September. The first two weeks in April I 


108 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


shall spend on the old farm in Southern New York, 
where I shall have fresh air and quiet to my heart’s 
content. ‘Through this rest I hope to be better than 
ever before. 

So you see, sir, | am provided for and have no oc- 
casion to accept your generous offer. But I thank 
you for it. It will be something good to remember. 
In case of emergency I shall feel that I may go to you 
for advice and assistance. I cannot afford to break 
down now. There is so much to do before I can 
rightfully take the rest that I had hoped not to need 
for years yet. But I have been very foolish to over- 
work so here, and shall steadfastly refuse to do 
double work hereafter. Give my hearty good wishes 
to your wife and daughter. 


I have succeeded in avoiding fresh colds and am 
charmed that I have had no drawbacks of any kind. 
Don’t you people worry over my “going back.” 
Miss Howard and I have the matter well in hand. 
She is delightful to me, and I am to have no further 
responsibility in the house. I have arranged for only 
five recitations and lectures a week next term. I shall 
not try to prove to any one that I have done more 
hard thinking in the last three years on the subject of 
my health—and to more purpose also—than they 
imagine. But my physicians know that I could not 
otherwise have rallied from the Saginaw experience. 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 109 


It hurts me to have those I love fretted more than is 
necessary. 


Mother, I never was in quite such perplexity before. 
Formerly when a teacher was sick, either in hospital 
or absent from College, the salary went on. Last 
summer the Trustees passed a law that when a 
teacher was away her salary should be stopped. 
Four of us have been overworked and have had to 
leave. We are all in the same situation, to us en- 
tirely unexpected. The policy may not be generous, 
considering how teachers work here; but there is 
nothing to be done. I am out of a month’s salary, 
besides all the expense of medicine, doctors, and 
traveling. I am troubled, especially at not finding 
it out until so late. Mr. Durant is sick again, Miss 
Howard tired and away, and nothing is done on 
time in matters of business. 

When I found this out yesterday, I wrote C., tell- 
ing him I wanted fifty dollars of the hundred he owes 
me sent at once to F., that if he could n’t send it all 
immediately, he must send what he could next week, 
If he does this, and F. can spare fifteen of it to pay 
you what I borrowed, I shall be much relieved. If 
he does n’t, F. must run in debt, and I will send 
enough to meet all the bills at the next payment the 
first of June. This being sick all winter has cer- 
tainly taken two hundred dollars out of my pocket, 


110 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


and I am afraid it will be five hundred before all is 
ended. I am glad you were able to make that good 
investment; but don’t put out any more at present, 
for I have set my heart on your coming East and 
Papa’s visiting his relations in the West this summer. 
Fifty dollars apiece pays traveling expenses, and I 
am going to set apart that from my salary for May 
and June for this specific purpose. I don’t want 
father to sell his horse and carriage so long as he 
stays in Saginaw. Work presses, and I stop. 


Mr. Durant preached to-day. If only you could 
have heard him, all of you! It seems as if some 
great strange thing had happened, and we must 
speak and walk softly — as when some one has died. 
There was an atmosphere of sacredness about it all. 
It is enough to break one’s heart to see his grand white 
head among these hundreds of girls, and hear him 
plead with them for “‘noble, white, unselfish woman- 
hood;” to hear him tell of his hope and happiness 
in them, and his longing that “the blood of Jesus 
Christ should cleanse them. from all sin.” That was 
his text. I never heard and never shall hear anything 
quite like it for clear logic and tender appeal. This 
is the second time he has preached. 


I heard a man at church this morning whose voice 


called back the dear old Windsor days. I wonder 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 111 


how the sermons which I used to think so good there 
would impress me now! This was a half hour of 
absolute commonplace. The man appeared to be a 
devoted soul who really wished to be useful, but who 
had n’t an idea in his head of what people are think- 
ing about. If such people would only buy farms and 
withdraw from trying to be leaders! Religious peo- 
ple now feel that they have no right to waste time in 
hearing pious nothings uttered by men who will not 
take the trouble to do any thinking. I fancy that now- 
adays many stay away from church conscientiously. 


Last Tuesday everything passed off successfully, 
I believe; though I could not judge very well, as I 
had to stand at the reception-room door and “‘re- 
ceive.” But I did not enjoy the address. It does 
seem impossible for a man to come here and speak 
in a sensible way to sensible women. As usual, our 
orator talked in a superior way about woman’s na- 
ture and condition, health, etc. He said he “‘knew 
the depths of a woman’s heart.” If I live a thousand 
years, I hope I may never make that remark about 
any man. I wait eagerly for the time when men will 
take our ability to study for granted, and will tell 
us what we want to hear about other subjects. 


These are but trifles, dear mother, I send for your 
festival. Since I have only you for my little girl, 


112 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I lavish my playthings upon you. I had planned 
something different. But the truth is 1 am having 
a hard time to get through the year. Not that I am 
sick, but I am very busy with doing “‘last things,” 
and very anxious about Mr. Durant’s health. Just 
now I am writing my annual report for the Trustees’ 
meeting next week. There are to be radical changes, 
some overturnings, and it is a question how some 
things will end. But I do not propose to worry. 


And so it is your birthday, you bride-to-be! Here’s 
a kiss for your forehead, and one for each of your 
blue eyes and sweet lips—even though they are 
now all another’s. But on a birthday you belong 
especially to “‘the family.” Happy may you be when 
you reach a birthday which doubles these years! 
It’s so beautiful out in the future for you; the onward 
path looks so safe and sweet. God keep you always 
glad and warm in the loving arms, both heavenly and 
earthly! I had a letter to-night from that happy wife 
E., and ever since have been thinking how blessed 
a thing it is to be the centre and soul of a real home, 
always certain that a tender heart holds you close. 
That certainly includes all that is best in life. 

As for myself I am beginning to get into the col- 
lege a little more, and I like what I have exceedingly. 
But I don’t feel at all satisfied with what I am doing 
nor with the distribution of my time. What with 





TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 113 


domestic work, corridor care, section meetings, and 
all the unexpected breaks that will come, I seem 
to accomplish very little; and there is so much of 
everything to be done here before things are as 
they ought to be! Perhaps each day’s little doing 
counts. I hope so. One must be patient, and these 
girls are certainly beautiful. 


This is so depressing a week that everything goes 
hard. We have just come from a meeting in the 
chapel, which is draped in the heaviest mourning. 
The desk on the platform has in front Garfield’s 
picture, life size, surrounded by heavy black folds. 
All around the platform and gallery draperies of 
black and white are festooned. A large flag hangs 
at half-mast from the organ. But I can’t make it 
seem possible that he is really dead. The students 
have had a mass meeting and nominated the presi- 
dent of each class as a committee to write a letter of 
sympathy to Mrs. Garfield. Last night the Faculty 
had a meeting and appointed me to write her also, ex- 
pressing their united sorrow. 

But we are in greater trouble over Mr. Durant 
than words can tell. He has been growing worse. 
Yesterday there was a council of four physicians 
from Boston and one from Philadelphia. Their 
decision was unanimous that there is little chance 


of recovery. They told Mrs. Durant; and when Mr 


114 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 
Durant asked what they had said, she told him. 


In the afternoon, ‘‘in case he should become uncon- 
scious,” he left his final instructions about the col- 
lege — “‘Christ’s College,” he called it. All we can 
do now is to wait and carry on the college work. 


All goes smoothly. Miss Howard has been in bed 
three days this week, and is not well at any time; 
nor have we enough teachers to meet the extra de- 
mands made by the new students. But my depart- 
ment is well organized, is running regularly, and it 
is understood that this year I do the work of only one. 
Several much-needed reforms in college arrange- 
ments have been brought about, reforms over which 
I have been very anxious. Altogether there is much 
that is hopeful in the outlook and my seven Ann 
Arbor friends here make the place a kind of home 
for me. 


My prarR Mrs. FREEMAN: 

When Alice told me at the dinner table how busy 
she had been this morning and was likely to be this 
afternoon, I begged the privilege of writing her home- 
letter this week. She consented, on condition of my 
assuring you that she gives up the pleasant duty not 
because she is not well or does not long to do it, but 
simply because she has such a multitude of things to 
attend to. I may say that I have been happily sur- 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 115 


prised to find how good her health has been through: 
out this term. She has learned to take care of herself 
much better than formerly, and I am greatly en- 
couraged. There seem to have been good reasons for 
her breaking down last Spring, which do not now 
exist, and I have much hope that she will keep well 
all the year. 

You will not wonder at her finding no time to 
write to-day when I tell you the great news. At a 
meeting of the Executive Committee of the Board of 
Trustees held this morning, Miss Alice E. Freeman 
was appointed Vice-President of Wellesley College 
for the remainder of the year! Won’t you be aston- 
ished? ‘There will be astonishment here to-night 
when the announcement is made. I think nobody 
has a suspicion of the design of the Trustees, but I 
am equally sure that there will be universal delight. 
Alice herself had not a hint of the matter till Tuesday. 
She was undecided at first, and did not accept until 
she had talked the matter over with Miss Howard, 
Mrs. Durant, and the Executive Committee, so that 
there is a perfect understanding. She is wonderfully 
fitted for the place, which is virtually that of Presi. 
dent. Miss Howard goes away at once for rest, 
leaving Alice in sole charge. You probably know 
that Miss Howard’s health is still feeble. A good 
deal of the time she is unable to attend to the duties 
of her position. Alice is not to be subordinate to her, 


1(6 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


but equal except in name. The Trustees have said, 
*“Do whatever you think best, Miss Freeman, and 
we will stand by you.” She is to retain charge of the 
department of history, but is to have a second as- 
sistant and to meet no classes except the seniors, 
and them only twice a week during the second half 
of the year. She prefers to do a little teaching for 
the sake of contact with the girls. 

Oh! I know she will succeed splendidly. Mr. 
Durant loved and trusted her perfectly. All the 
Trustees have entire confidence in her, and there is 
nobody else here whom the girls so universally ad- 
mire and love. We Ann Arbor people are very proud. 
We are hoping Alice will not need to work harder 
than she has been working, though of course her re- 
sponsibility will be much heavier. But she will have 
such hearty codperation on all sides that I think she 
will not find the burden too great. I feel quite exalted 
to be the first to tell you of this honor, but you can 
hardly be prouder of Alice than you have already 
had reason to be. 

(Later.) I wish Alice’s father and mother could 
have been in the chapel to-night when, before 
evening prayers, the chairman of our Executive 
Committee made the announcement of her promo- 
tion. His words, so fervent and strong, were such 
as Mr. Durant himself might have used. To me it 
will always be a memorable occasion. But I must 


TEACHING AT WELLESLEY 117 


lose no time in sending off this letter with its great 
news. M. O. M. 


I have been writing letters every moment to-day, 
none of them personal you may be sure, all on col- 
lege business, and still I go to bed with twenty-three 
left for to-morrow. When I am fairly started in my 
new work I hope to keep more nearly even. To- 
morrow I am invited to lunch with one of the Trustees, 
and all are as kind and cordial as possible. ‘The 
girls and teachers too are so loyal and thoughtful that 
I am full of hope, even though I can never see my 
way a single day ahead. There is a great deal in 
it all that is pleasant, but during the last two months 
I have been obliged to get a good many things — 
warm things for winter and a few nice things suit- 
able for “the acting president.” You see I have 
to wear good clothes all the time now to compen- 
sate for my undignified appearance. How much I 
would give for a few gray hairs! I am glad you are 
glad at the promotion, and that Saginaw people are 
pleased. Warm letters come from many friends. 


Vil 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 


In speaking of Mrs. Palmer just after her death 
President Eliot said: “‘As we look back on the chief 
events of her too short career, the first thing that 
strikes us is its originality at every stage; she was 
in the best sense a pioneer all through her life. When 
she went to the University of Michigan as a student, 
she was one of a small band of young women, ven- 
turing with motives of intellectual ambition into a 
state university which had just been opened to 
women. At twenty-two years of age she was already 
principal of a high school in Michigan. At twenty- 
four she took a professorship of history in a new 
college for women where all the officers and teachers 
were women — a pioneer work indeed. At twenty- 
six she became president of that novel college, at a 
time when its worth had not yet been demonstrated. 
Indeed its policy was then held by many to be of 
doubtful soundness, and its financial future ex- 
tremely difficult. What courage and devotion these 
successive acts required! Her work at Wellesley was 
creation, not imitation; and it was work done in the 
face of doubts, criticisms, and prophecies of evil.” 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 119 


How original Miss Freeman was at Wellesley 
becomes plainer when we consider how short a time 
she was there. Her administration lasted but six 
years. Beginning with the so-called vice-presidency 
in November, 1881, it ended in December, 1887. 
During this brief term Miss Freeman created a 
Wellesley type which has proved durable. This and 
the following chapters set forth the means by which 
this was accomplished. Briefly, it may be said that 
she fashioned the college after her own image. But 
what were her policies and methods? Where lay her 
difficulties? By what successive changes in organiza- _ 
tion, studies, finances, equipment, did she so sud- 
denly transform a hastily gathered and somewhat 
distrusted body of teachers and pupils into the firm- 
built college which, when she left it, commanded 
universal respect ? These questions can be answered 
only imperfectly, partly because of that very original- 
ity which lends a sort of mystery to all her doings, 
partly on account of the absence of early documents. 
In that confused time there were no financial state- 
ments, no records of the Faculty, no published 
reports of the president. Miss Freeman, it is true, 
at the close of her first year printed a president’s 
report; but funds for the purpose seem to have been 
lacking, and the experiment was not repeated. Her 
letters seldom refer to her own affairs, but are full 
of those of the one to whom she writes. My acquaint- 


120 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


ance with either her or the college did not begin till 
near the close of her term. For the most part, there- 
fore, I am obliged to depend on catalogues and on 
the memories of her early associates. 

Pioneer as Miss Freeman was at Wellesley, her 
work there would have been impossible if the way 
had not been prepared by Mr. Durant. On his broad 
foundations she built. His large designs were hers 
also.” He had selected her from the Faculty as the 
one whose temper was most congenial to his own 
In the preceding chapter I have called attention to 
his dread of routine, his aversion to text-books, his 
approval of laboratory methods, original research, 
and whatever arouses individual activity. This 
forceful spirit shaped the plan of his college. In his 
catalogue for 1877 he announces that the conditions 
for entrance will be steadily raised. Then, after 
prescribing the studies of the freshman year, — and 
prescription was at that time the practice in all col- 
leges except Harvard, — he proposes to throw open 
to sophomores seven different elective courses, or 
groups of studies, among which a student may 
choose. Each of these courses contains also within 
its coherent group large elements of election. And 
this is true even of that “ general course ” which 
he states is “ for many probably the most desirable.” 
Few colleges in the country had at that time a pro- 
gramme so liberal. He provides for graduate work, 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 121 


allows students not candidates for a degree to enter 
as specials, and offers to mature women who have 
been teaching for several years — “‘teacher spe- 
cials’’ — the privilege of following for brief periods 
whatever studies they please. He encourages athlet- 
ics too, introduces rowing, and requires of every girl 
at least an hour a day of exercise in the open air; 
declaring that “when the women of the country 
unite in observing, protesting against, and reforming 
the fatal causes which destroy girls’ health, the 
calumny that woman’s mind and woman’s body are 
too frail to bear the pursuit of knowledge will perish 
with other forgotten prejudices.” | 
In spite, however, of these far-sighted provisions, 
Wellesley College when Mr. Durant died was by 
no means what he or Miss Freeman desired it to be. 
Jn fact it existed but in germ. There had been no 
time to elaborate its organization. In the last two 
years Mr. Durant was sinking, as was also his lieu- 
tenant, Miss Howard; and in the previous years his 
own mind had passed through great changes in 
trying to grasp the notion of his proposed college. 
Originally he schemed it as a female seminary, after 
the pattern of Mt. Holyoke. For this a charter was 
obtained in 1870. In 1873 the name was changed to 
Wellesley College. In 1875 its vast building was 
opened and its first students were admitted. In 1877 
the right to grant degrees was obtained. Not till 1879 


122 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


did it graduate a class, or begin graduate work; not 
till 1880 did it drop its preparatory department. It 
was this rough sketch of a college, rather than the 
finished thing, which the girl-president received 
from the dying founder; a sketch truly noble, but 
needing correction, completion, and — as prelimi- 
nary to these—a general setting in order. My 
presentation of her work at Wellesley will be divided 
into two parts: in the first I group her more im- 
portant administrative measures, in the second I 
attempt some analysis of her personal influence. 
Certain features of Mr. Durant’s scheme, certain 
of its best features, were not developed. During 
Miss Freeman’s administration the policy of elective 
studies was everywhere a novelty, and one which, 
being not yet understood, stirred strong opposition. 
It involved also grave financial difficulties in execu- 
tion. It was an experimental method, which only a | 
strong college could afford to practice extensively. 
Pressed upon a college not yet firmly organized, it 
tended to increase debt and disorder, its stimulating 
methods being easily mistaken for absence of 
restraint. Under election, too, more work is thrown 
on the Faculty, a class being broken up into small 
groups, each requiring a different treatment. More 
teachers are called for, and a larger fund for paying 
them than is necessary under the prescribed system. 
Wellesley was just starting. Its students, its teachers, 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 123 


were ill prepared for their strange work, and it had 
no endowment beyond grounds, buildings, and 
library. For such a college conservatism was wise. 
Naturally inclined by years and disposition to pro- 
gressive methods, Miss Freeman on the whole held 
steadily to simplicity, order, solidity of organization, 
avoiding whatever might lead to confusion, loose- 
ness, experiment, and expense. Almost imper- 
ceptibly Mr. Durant’s seven elective courses con- 
tracted themselves to two: the General Classical 
Course, leading to the B. A. degree — substantially 
as he had planned it — containing, besides its litera- 
ture and history, a good dose of mathematics and — 
science, a prescribed freshman year, and about a 
third of its later studies elective; while a course 
requiring no Greek at entrance, and having through- 
out a larger proportion of science, received the B.S. 
For music, as in Mr. Durant’s time, no specific 
degree was given. A student was allowed to dis- 
tribute music throughout either of the other two 
regular courses, thus expanding them to five years, 
and receiving a degree accordingly. Fuller develop- 
ment of the elective system was — in my judgment 
wisely — deferred to a later time. Nor can I learn 
that the three courses leading to advanced honors, 
which Mr. Durant planned, were ever considerably 
elected. Probably in that early day few students were 
suitably prepared. 


124 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


But if Miss Freeman accepted a policy of restraint 
in the matter of election and did not carry individual 
option much beyond the point where Mr. Durant 
left it, she did so only in order that she might the 
more thoroughly consolidate instruction, adjust it 
to her limited means, and give the college a firmer 
hold on the community. The conditions for entrance 
were repeatedly raised and their exact enforcement 
watched. Greek was first required at entrance in 
1881. English literature and composition were soon 
after added, with history, both ancient and modern. 
Special students were not admitted unless able to 
pass examinations. Greater care was used in setting 
and marking examination papers. In 1880 it had 
been decided to accept the certificates of certain 
‘schools as entitling their graduates to enter college 
without examination. This system has many advan- 
tages; but if the schools are not frequently inspected 
and held to a rigid standard, certification becomes 
a paper requirement and scholarship sinks. Miss 
Freeman systematized inspection and drew up a 
certificate which, while laying little stress on opinions 
about the student’s competence, demanded the pre- 
cise facts of her training during the immediately 
preceding years. Similar care in the conduct of 
examinations was enforced throughout the college. 
There was a general rise in standards. Many in- 
formants tell me that the most marked change pro- 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 125 


duced by Miss Freeman’s coming was this new 
atmosphere of exactitude, work, and insistence on 
what a college should mean, succeeding a sort of 
boarding-school looseness. The girls no longer 
played at going to college, — they really went. 

How to obtain properly qualified students was a 
difficult problem. College-fitting schools for boys 
had long been common and excellent, but of course 
there could be nothing of the kind for girls until 
girls’ colleges also came into being. In only a few 
high schools were girls allowed to join classes which 
fitted boys for college. On account of this lack of 
schools Mr. Durant was obliged to open a prepara- 
tory department and train his candidates from the 
start. For several years these students largely out- 
numbered those in the college. But in the year that 
Miss Freeman became vice-president the prepara- 
tory department was cut off and the independent fit- 
ting school of Dana Hall was established in Wellesley. 
To founding more such feeders Miss Freeman ad- 
dressed herself, and her work in this direction was 
one of her greatest services to the college. In 1884 
an important auxiliary school was opened in Phila- 
delphia. Before the end of her presidency she had 
organized fifteen others in different parts of the 
country, officered for the most part by Wellesley 
graduates, and with courses so shaped by the college 
that their graduates could safely enter it on certifi- 


126 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


cate. Perhaps this plan of connecting her college 
with a special group of schools was suggested to her 
by the example of Michigan. 

One of Miss Freeman’s chief anxieties was the 
problem of housing. To it she refers in her first 
report, and it never ceased to trouble her. Only so 
many students could be received as college buildings 
would hold; for the village of Wellesley, half a mile 
distant, was small and at that time ill provided with 
boarding-houses. On account of scanty accommoda- 
tions more than a hundred desirable candidates were 
turned away each year. Indeed the number of stu- 
dents increased less than two hundred during the 
whole of Miss Freeman’s presidency, rising gradu- 
ally from four hundred and fifty to six hundred and 
twenty-five, as places for them could be found. The 
original building, four hundred and seventy-five feet 
long, held three hundred; Stone Hall, given by Mrs. 
Stone in 1880, taking another hundred. In 1881 Mr. 
Simpson gave a cottage with accommodations for 
twenty-five, and in the same year Mr. and Mrs. 
Durant fitted up a second cottage for half as many 
more. But when all were filled girls still clamored for 
entrance, and larger numbers would have benefited 
the college itself. While every college is in large meas- 
ure a charity school and does not expect its students 
to pay for what they get, up to a limit this loss dimin- 
ishes as students increase. A certain cost for plant 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 127 


is incurred in any case, and this may with advan- 
tage be widely distributed. While Miss Freeman had 
no financial responsibility — all funds being under 
the exclusive control of Mrs. Durant — she was 
naturally anxious to make the income more nearly 
equal the expense and also to extend the influence 
of Wellesley. 

In 1885, when the decennial of the college arrived, 
she started a general subscription for a new hall, 
Norumbega, which was opened in the following 
year. But it was one of the disappointments of her 
administration that the public could not be brought 
at once to the support of Wellesley. Few gifts came 
from outside the circle of Mr. Durant’s friends, 
though within that circle there were generous and dis- 
criminating givers. Professor Eben Norton Horsford, 
in particular, endowed the library, provided the 
means for granting professors sabbatical years, and in 
general looked after the comfort of students, teachers, 
and president with singular tact and devotion. But 
a larger income was necessary; and Miss Freeman, 
though feeling it well to keep the charges as low as 
possible and so to make the college accessible to poor 
students, was compelled to raise the fee for board 
and tuition in 1882 from two hundred and fifty dol- 
lars to two hundred and seventy-five, and again in 
1884 to three hundred. Aids to students, however, 
were also increased. In her presidency the number 


128 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


of scholarships was doubled, as were too the gifts 
of the Students’ Aid Society, a band of ladies organ- 
ized for the private assistance of those in need. To 
commemorate Miss Freeman after she became Mrs. 
Paimer, Mrs. Durant in 1888 erected a new hall and 
named it Freeman Cottage. 

But if Miss Freeman was thus hampered by the 
inadequate preparation of students and by meagre 
financial resources, she became only the more deter- 
mined and ingenious in providing her girls the utmost 
still possible in scholarship, health, character, and 
enjoyment. Where little money is, there often 
appears a kind of compensatory devotion. Perhaps 
too the limitation of numbers was for another reason 
not altogether a loss. It enabled her to choose from 
those who applied the intellectually and physically 
strong, giving her a compact body of earnest stu- 
dents who counted themselves exceptionally fortu- 
nate. Such a company is excellent material for the 
building of a college. In it hard work, loyalty, unity 
of ideals are more easily secured. All students of that 
day knew one another’s names and were known by 
their president. Friendships were more intimate, 
the life of the college more intense, romance was easy. 

As regards teachers Miss Freeman’s policy was to 
spend on them the largest possible percentage of 
income. She wished to see their number increase 
and their hours of work diminish. She herself had 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 129 


had serious experience in the debilitating effects of 
many required hours. She knew that the most stim- 
ulating teaching cannot be had from those who lack 
leisure. Of course salaries were small; but she con- 
trived to secure half a dozen capital scholars in her 
chief chairs and to assure herself that each person 
appointed to an inferior post had some distinctive 
merit. She understood that the deepest claim on her 
as an appointer came from the students, that they 
be assured of excellent teaching; and that the claim 
of individual teachers was only secondary, that they 
be kept in comfortable places. She did not hesitate 
therefore kindly to drop a tolerable instructor so 
soon as a superior appeared. Her estimate of per- 
sons was pretty accurate, and she left a much 
stronger Faculty than she found. 

That Faculty was built up out of departmental 
groups; that is, all teachers dealing with acommon 
subject were banded together under a_head-pro- 
fessor and constituted a single unit. This professor 
arranged the work of the department and was re- 
sponsible for its quality to the president. Miss Free- 
man developed and dignified the departments. They 
appear for the first time in her second catalogue, 
their organized meetings beginning in the preceding 
year. They then numbered twelve, but had risen 
to sixteen when she retired. In earlier days teachers 
of every rank met in the not very important faculty 


130 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


meetings, to discuss such details of government or 
instruction as were not already settled by Mr. Du- 
rant. After the formation of departments Miss 
Freeman left to the general Faculty matters of dis- 
cipline and of routine administration, but more and 
more turned to the heads of departments for con- 
sultation on questions of educational policy. In this 
way almost insensibly there grew up the body known 
as the Academic Council, which has continued to 
this day. Seeking stability as she everywhere did, 
she found she could best send her ideas through the 
college by coming close to the permanent leaders. 
For similar reasons, standing committees were formed 
to take charge of such weighty interests as entrance 
examinations, preparatory schools, graduate in- 
struction, the library, the choice of studies; this 
last committee being a veritable board of advisers, 
to which every girl must submit her schedule of 
electives before she could register it as her own. 

The library had its collections doubled and _ its 
cataloguing systematized. Much was done for the 
laboratories, for which she makes an appeal in 
her first report. She refitted the gymnasium, intro- 
ducing into it the Sargent system of apparatus, of 
measurements, and health records, and putting at 
its head an enthusiastic director of physical culture. 
Competitive contests were forbidden, but such co- 
operative sports as bring health, enjoyment, and 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 131 


grace were earnestly encouraged. Attention was paid 
to the voices of the students, and an officer was 
appointed to train them in quiet and expressive 
reading. Ventilation and hygiene were insisted on. 
During her time the college passed through no seri- 
ous illness. Perhaps she took more care of the health 
of the students through being herself a physician's 
daughter. 

Providing thus for the internal well-being of the 
college, she soon began to study its relations with 
the outside world. In those days Wellesley was 
more isolated than at present. Its charming hills 
and woods were little known. Mr. and Mrs. Durant 
had loved modesty more than advertising, and their 
college came into existence without that noise which 
has latterly been thought appropriate to the birth of 
universities. So quiet an infancy pleased Miss Free- 
man; but as the college grew, she resolved to bring 
it into closer connection with other colleges and with 
the community around. This attempt made one 
of the distinctive features of her administration. Of 
course her attractive personality and winning speech 
opened all doors, and in the interest of Wellesley 
she accepted invitations for public addresses up to 
the limits of her strength. In different parts of the 
country she helped to found Wellesley clubs. To 
Wellesley she invited whatever notable person visited 
the neighboring cities. In her last year more than 


132 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


fifty public lectures were given there, and half as 
many concerts. Only one vacancy occurred in the 
Board of Trustees in her time, but she reconstituted 
the subordinate board, the Board of Visitors, and 
packed it with experts, who brought criticism and 
encouragement to the various departments. To 
enlarge the social life of teachers and students, she 
held frequent receptions and introduced to Wellesley 
the men and women of Cambridge and Boston. Into 
the society of those cities she herself entered. From 
Harvard she sometimes borrowed temporary teachers 
and with that university she soon established rela- 
tions which a certain dislike on Mr. Durant’s part 
for his alma mater had prevented from being earlier 
formed. 

Such then were some of the constructive methods 
by which a scholarly, united, and admired college 
was rapidly built up. Seeking to raise the rank of 
Wellesley until it should equal that of any New 
England college, she found herself hampered by 
lack of fitting schools, by a loose system of admission 
on certificate, by lack of accommodation in college 
buildings for suitable numbers, and by consequent 
Jack of funds. She found her teachers too few, badly 
chosen and badly paid, burdened with excessive 
routine work, and needing to be more solidly organ- 
ized into departments. She found meagre labora- 
tories and library, no provision for physical training, 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY = 133 


and little connection between the college and the 
Jearned and social world outside. At the close of 
her administration tnese deficiencies had disap- 
peared, without leaving debt behind. 

This truly creative work was accomplished by 
substantially the methods here described. There 
is nothing striking about them. They cannot be 
turned into attractive reading. Hearing of Miss 
Freeman’s brilliant administration, we do not natu- 
rally think of measures so homespun and _ pains- 
taking. For that reason I have lingered long on this 
first part of my account, trying to explain the dry pro- 
fessional technicalities over which her young years 
were spent. But I imagine most of us will hardly 
be interested in watching the work of an architect’s 
office. The result alone engages us. All beauty, 
however, is grounded in such technicalities, and 
originality consists in finding the beauty there. 
That at least was the type of her originality. She 
was no revolutionist, but out of almost any humdrum 
and disheartening conditions she would contrive 
to evolve life. Or do I wrong her in speaking of 
contrivance? Was it rather that her believing and 
creative mind saw nothing of what others counted 
humdrum and disheartening, being altogether oc- 
cupied with the ideal hid within? It may be so. 
She took her duties lightly and once exclaimed to 
the president of another college, “‘Is n’t it fun to be 


134 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


a president!’’ When I applied to her faithful secre- 
tary for information about the perplexities of these 
opening years, I received the following reply: ‘The 
thought of Miss Freeman’s feeling any perplexity in 
her position at Wellesley seems strange to me, who 
knew so well the inner life of the office. Underneath 
her cheerfulness, her keen sense of humor, her 
thoughtfulness for others, her joy in all that makes 
life lovely, there ran a current of confidence and. un- 
hesitating trust in her Heavenly Father. She conse- 
quently never appeared perplexed. ‘The presidency 
of Wellesley was not a difficult position for her. In 
each emergency she saw by intuition the right course 
to pursue.”’ But that she, almost the first of woman 
presidents and with little in the past for a guide, 
should have possessed this instinctive discernment 
and, youthful and ardent though she was, should 

have known that it is the plodding path which 
leads to glory, must, I suppose, indicate in her 
something like genius. 


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THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY (continuep) 


Tue account of Miss Freeman’s career at Wellesley 
thus far given is obviously unfair and incomplete: 
unfair because it assumes that the policies described 
were altogether hers, regardless of the wise and 
loyal codperation of her fellow trustees and profes- 
sors. Yet this unfairness is so inevitable that it will 
readily be pardoned. We are obliged to say that 
Wellington won Waterloo, though we know how 
helpless he would have been without the courage of 
the undistinguished soldier. Miss Freeman always 
declared that the rapid rise of Wellesley was due to 
a multitude of causes and persons. Of course it 
was, a multitude directed by herself. No president 
ever had better helpers; nor they, one whom it was 
better worth while to help. 

But in calling my account incomplete I speak of 
something of larger consequence, and to repairing 
the omission I devote this entire chapter; for the 
administrative measures just recounted could have 
had no such effect as actually followed if they had not 
been supported throughout by an extraordinary 
personal influence. Personality and policies together 


136 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


composed Miss Freeman’s power, spirituality and 
mechanics, the two supplemental, each of little worth 
without the other. To considering some aspects of 
that pervasive personal influence I now turn. 

In the first place Miss Freeman came into very 
close contact with her students. She lived among 
them, until her last year having her private rooms 
in immediate connection with her business offices in 
the great building. Even when she removed to 
quieter quarters in Norumbega Cottage, she dined 
every day with thirty girls and talked with double that 
number. Each morning she held office hours, when 
any student could consult her on any subject. But 
she did not shut her door at other times, and a large 
part of every day was given to these interviews. In 
that small office the bent of many a life has been 
determined. At that time there was no dean. All 
the care of the students fell upon her. By some means 
she managed to meet most of them soon after their 
arrival and to turn their faces in the right direction. 
It was done incidentally, with few words, and quite 
as a matter of course. A student writes :— 

“When I entered Wellesley, I arrived late in the 
afternoon and was shown to my room. Soon a bell 
rang, and I tried to find the dining room. I went 
down to the first floor and wandered to the south 
door. ‘There, by good luck, stood Miss Freeman, 
looking out over the lake. Of course she came to me 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 137 


at once, asked who I was, said the college would 
be good to me, and then took me to the dining room, 
talking in her easy cordial fashion all the way, and 
found a place for me at one of the tables. I wish 
I could remember the things she said. I only recall 
the strong impression of her kindness.” 

When a girl had once been spoken to, however 
briefly, her face and name were fixed on a memory 
where each incident of her subsequent career found 
its place beside the original record. A super- 
intendent of education sends me the following 
instance : — 

“Once after she had been speaking in my city, 
she asked me to stand beside her at a reception. As 
the Wellesley graduates came forward to greet her 
-— there were about eighty of them — she said some- 
thing to each which showed that she knew her. 
Some she called by their first names; others she 
asked about their work, their families, or whether 
they had succeeded in plans about which they had 
evidently consulted her. The looks of pleased sur- 
prise which flashed over the faces of those girls I 
cannot forget. They revealed to me something of 
Miss Freeman’s rich and radiant life. For though she 
seemed unconscious of doing anything unusual, and 
for her I suppose it was usual, her own face reflected 
the happiness of the girls and showed a serene Joy 
in creating that happiness.” 


138 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Probably she had a natural aptitude for such re- 
membrance, but she cultivated it also. An eminent 
journalist writes: “‘I recall a memorable conversa- 
tion I once had with her. She had told me a little 
pf the means she took in getting and keeping in 
mind the names of her many hundred Wellesley 
girls, and I said, “That is something I never could 
do.’ “Oh yes, you could,’ she replied, ‘if you had to. 
It is simply that you never had to do it. Whatever 
we have to do we can always do.’ This quiet con- 
fidence in the ability to do what needs to be done 
seems to me one of the secrets of her power. She 
leaned on her necessities, instead of letting herself be 
broken by them; and that simple disclosure of her 
method has greatly added to the power of my life.” 

But in her close contact with students, playful 
though it often was, she kept her dignity and her 
easy power of command. In a previous chapter I 
have shown how important for the young college 
was the almost despotic control exercised by Mr. 
Durant. This she inherited, and in her own way 
maintained. She tempered it, it is true, with singular 
sweetness, usually capturing love and approval be- 
fore obedience. But nevertheless, her will was law. 
Trustees, Faculty, and students alike gave it a pretty 
free course. All felt in her what Kent saw in Lear: 
“You have that in your countenance which I would 
fain call master.” This was well understood and, 


"THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 139 


becoming a tradition, tended to perpetuate itself. A 
gentleman tells me that when he attended asmall New 
England College he found some of the regulations 
galling. On remonstrating he was told, ‘“‘“You had 
better go to Wellesley, where, whenever the little 
president raises her hand, the whole college hurries 
to obey.” Yet her authority did not rest on bare will; 
on knowledge rather, on sanity, poise, and alarge 
way of handling business. 


An incidental greatness charactered 
Her unconsidered ways. 


An instructive anecdote has been sent me: “‘ There 
came to Wellesley for a period of special study a 
woman who had already spent several years in teach- 
ing. She was nervous, vain, and touchy, easily find- 
ing in whatever was said or looked some covert dis- 
paragement of herself. As she was complaining one 
day of some recent rudeness, Miss Freeman said, 
“Why not be superior to these things and let them go 
unregarded ? You will soon find you have nothing 
to regard.’ ‘Miss Freeman,’ retorted Miss S., ‘I 
wonder how you would like to be insulted.’ Miss 
Freeman drew herself up with splendid dignity: 
“Miss S., there is no one living who could insult me.’ 
And she was right. Nobody would have dared do 
so. But had they attempted it, they would have 
found her altogether beyond their reach.” 


140 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I cannot discover that the universal worship 
marred in any respect her simplicity or transferred 
her attention from the matter in hand to herself. 
She took it lightly, as a part of the nature of things. 
Love was inherently good, and people should prac- 
tice it. I think she would have been disturbed by its 
absence. Being given, she did not dwell upon it as 
due to herself, but chiefly noticed the new worth it 
gave the giver. Nobody could claim love as by right. 
I have often heard her quote George Herbert’s 
noble line, — 


Love is a present for a mighty king. 


When she came upon a specific case of adoration 
it humbled her. 

Having, then, such intimacy with the students and ° 
at the same time such exaltation above them, she 
was in the best position to call on them for aid in any 
exigency. And this she constantly did, letting them 
understand that the college depended on them for its 
well-being, and that they were to codperate with her 
in keeping it sound. Nobody was allowed to forget 
its great motto. One writes: “During my last winter 
an epidemic of hysteria seized the college, chiefly 
the freshmen. There were frequent screams over 
trifles, and gossip ran riot. Miss Freeman called us 
seniors together and said she held us responsible for 
the continuance of such folly. What did we older 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 141 


girls mean by allowing an atmosphere where such 
things were possible? It stopped.” 

Or again: “An incident showed me how she kept 
individual students in mind and heart. There came 
to college from my city an eccentric, lawless girl, 
J. L. Before her lawlessness was fully known 
Miss Freeman was much concerned about her, 
hearing (she always did hear or see everything) that 
J. was ostracized and unhappy. There were many 
Kentucky girls in college then, but I was the oldest 
of them. Miss Freeman accordingly sent for me, 
told me frankly that she was worried about J.’s 
future, and said that if she was to be made into a 
worthy student the girls must help. She asked me 
to bring the other Kentucky girls into friendly rela- 
tions with J. and try to change her attitude. We did 
try, but it was useless. J. was an anarchist from 
birth, and soon left college.” 

One morning she announced at prayers that she 
had turned “ some girl ”’ out of college, and did n’t 
wish to hear of her again. Lately, when silly rumors 
had been flying about the grounds and she had asked 
students where they got them, they had said, ““Some 
girl told me.” That girl was gone. Hereafter they 
need n’t believe anything they heard from a person 
without a name. One winter an attempt was made 
to blackmail an important person connected with 
the college. Because it was bravely resisted, serious 


142 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


scandal was threatened. Before the papers spoke, 
Miss Freeman called her girls together, told them. 
briefly the dastardly story, declared it false, and said 
she should rely on them to refuse to speak of it either 
among themselves or to others. The newspapers 
thundered, but Wellesley noticed nothing. It was 
strangely absorbed in its own pursuits. 

This codperative method was even applied to the 
single student. When a girl brought her a request 
which she could not grant, she seldom gave it an 
immediate refusal; she set before her petitioner the 
considerations involved, obliged her to do her own 
thinking, and finally to suggest as of herself the very 
settlement which Miss Freeman approved. Amusing 
stories are reported of girls who came to ask for 
something, and went away delighted to have obtained 
the opposite. 

One of them says: “In the spring of my senior 
year I had an invitation to spend the holidays in 
Washington, and my family strongly urged me to 
arrange the visit. Overjoyed, I went to Miss Free- 
man to obtain permission to leave college several 
days before the vacation. She was very warm, 
envying me the prospect of seeing the Capitol for 
the first time. She promised to ask the Faculty for 
permission and to state to them how great the op- 
portunity for me was. But she inquired how many 
examinations and written exercises I should miss, 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 143 


incidentally calling attention to the fact that the 
professors would have to give me special ones in 
the following term. Gradually I felt the disadvan- 
tage of this irregularity. Still, there was Wash- 
ington! And I asked if she herself would not be 
tempted to go? Indeed she would, she said, but 
college work was the nearest, the first, business. A 
Washington invitation might come again; a senior 
year in college, never. So, quite as if my own judg- 
ment had been my guide, I decided that I did not 
want to go to Washington. A little later, when the 
office door had closed, I stopped on the stairs and 
asked myself if this was the same person who had 
passed there half an hour before, and what had 
induced me to give up the coveted journey when 
there was no hint on Miss Freeman’s part of com- 
pulsion, much less of refusal.” 

College presidents are sometimes suspected by 
students of prevarication and falsehood, and cer- 
tainly they are often called on to look at the same 
subject from different points of view. But her girls 
knew that though she might guide them skilfully, 
she persistently sought their interest. Her heart was 
with them. She was an obstinate believer in their 
worth. In later life, as we walked the streets of a 
foreign city, she would often be seized in passing by 
some exclamatory girl; and when after too long delay 
I disengaged her and asked who this tiresome person 


144 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


was, she pretty regularly answered, ‘‘ Why, don’t you 
know Mary X? She was one of the most remarkable 
girls we ever graduated from Wellesley.”’ ‘They all 
were, and the hardy faith carried both her and them 
through many difficulties. One of them shall de- 
scribe the process :— 

‘“‘A great reason for her strange control of EEL 
was, I think, that she always seized on some good 
point in a girl’s character, emphasized that, and 
made the girl feel that she must bring the whole up 
to the level of this. She took for granted, or appeared 
to do so, the girl’s good intentions. Many a time I 
have heard her say with the greatest apparent confi- 
dence to some wavering girl, ‘Of course you could n’t 
do anything in this matter that is untrue or unlady- 
like. That would be quite out of keeping with you.’ 
And the wavering girl was promptly strengthened in 
her determination to do the right thing at any cost. 
The same method was worked in intellectual ways. 
My friend Miss M. returned to Wellesley after a 
four years’ absence, hoping to complete her course 
in a year. The advanced requirements made this 
difficult. She talked over the situation with Miss 
Freeman, feeling greatly discouraged before the 
interview. Miss Freeman sketched out the hard 
necessary work and said, “Now, Miss M., that is 
what I call a stiff schedule; but with your habits it is 
possible enough.’ Miss M. went out determined not 
to disappoint her confidence, and she did not.” 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 145 


Sometimes there was no direct appeal to a better 
nature in the one who sought her aid, but a kind of 
transmission of force occurred through mere contact. 
Virtue went out from her. In a letter received 
shortly after her death I read :— 

**Mrs. Palmer had a strange effect on me. When 
I saw her, I felt as if I could do things that I never 
dreamed of before. Even now, whenever I think of 
her, I have a sense of dignity in my life. I don’t know 
what it is. It seems as if her appreciation of the 
worth of things puts a spirit into me that carries me 
along until the next time I think of her. I should n’t 
care to go on in a world in which she had n’t been.” 

Probably the ennobling atmosphere which seemed 
thus to radiate from her presence was in some mea- 
sure connected with her religious faith. She believed 
that conscious fellowship with God is the foundation 
of every strong life, the natural source from which all 
must derive their power and their peace. Hers was a 
dedicated soul. Mr. Durant had given the religious 
tone to Wellesley. This she deepened, diversified, 
and freed from artificiality. In the first year of her 
presidency she reformed the methods of Bible study, 
abolishing the daily classes to which no serious study 
was given, and which seemed to her to encourage 
sentimentality. Instead, she put into each year of 
the curriculum two hours a week of examinable in- 
struction. She organized a Christian Association at 


146 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Wellesley, but refused to allow it to become affiliated 
with organizations elsewhere, or to be patterned after 
any narrow type. She turned it into a veritable col- 
lege church, gathering into it devout souls of all sorts, 
and those who longed to be devout, until its ample 
organization embodied pretty fully the spiritual 
aspirations of the place. To it she transferred her 
own membership, and for the remainder of her life 
she belonged to no other church. 

I am not aware that she ever conducted chapel 
services on Sunday, though she exercised much care 
in selecting those who did. But every morning she 
became the priestess of her household, regularly 
taking charge of prayers, and delighting so to begin 
the day. Attendance was then required. I doubt if 
one student less would have been present had there 
been no requisition. For all knew that prayer was 
her supreme expression; they felt the solemn glow 
and entered with her into a divine presence. Her 
voice throbbed with ardor, insight, and self-efface- 
ment. In simple language she spoke to God as one 
who had known God; and of her girls as one who 
understood their dreams, joys, and perplexities. I 
have observed that persons naturally reserved some- 
times express their inmost minds more easily in pub- 
lic than in private. They are sheltered by the multi- 
tude. It was so with her, who rarely referred to 
religion in conversation. Her needy company set her 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 147 


free. All felt her love and genuineness, and wondered 
at the appropriateness of her words. It was com- 
monly believed that Miss Freeman’s Bible was not 
the ordinary volume, for out of it came strange 
chapters, extraordinarily fitted to whatever occasion 
arose. Her familiarity with it was large, and from 
that storehouse of spiritual experience she liked to 
bring together passages from writers of different 
times uttering a similar thought in unlike ways. The 
morning assembly, too, she found a convenient occa- 
sion for addressing the whole body of students on 
matters of general consequence. 

But there is danger in the religious temper. For 
some persons the light of eternal things casts a shade 
over the temporal. In view of what is abiding and 
august, the passing interest is dulled. This danger 
- even besets those who are predominantly moral. 
They become narrow, heedless of what cannot at 
once be related to law; while momentary matters, 
chance, facts, the mere happenings of our hurly- 
burly world, do not joyously engage them. This is 
the same as to say that such persons frequently lack 
humor and spontaneity — yes, strongly marked in- 
dividuality. Of course deficiencies quite as grave 
are noticeable in those who follow their own vagrant 
will and listen to the call of the instant. They are 
soon found unimportant in the stress of serious 
affairs. Yet their temperament forms a necessary 


148 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


supplement to the profounder insights of the austere. 
A saintly minister of my acquaintance on being asked 
why he was going to Europe for the summer, wisely 
answered, “To de-moralize myself.” We queer 
human creatures cannot fill out our full stature till 
we harmonize within us contradictory attributes. 
Such splendid contradictions shone in Miss 
Freeman, giving her access to persons of every type 
and imparting to herself perpetual freshness. Cus- 
tom never staled her. It easily might, had not she 
been she; for she was called to set a woman’s college 
in order. I have shown how her administration 
tended everywhere to solidity and respect for law; 
how she herself was a prodigious force for righteous- 
ness among her girls. Yet this seriousness was but 
one aspect of her, and must straightway be offset in 
any just estimate of her influence. For hers was essen- 
tially a spontaneous and abounding nature. She 
found her way to an important issue as often blindly 
as through calculation. One cannot say too often 
how impulsive she was, sportive, enchanted with 
the shifting show, the swiftly varying expressions of 
her face telling how eagerly she followed the flight of 
things that cannot endure. One writes: “‘I doubt if 
I ever knew any one who gave me so strong a feeling 
of the pure joy of living.” It was as good as a circus 
to be with her, for something novel was always going 
on. And this incessant regard for the small and 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 149 


momentary was treated as altogether honorable, in 
herself or in another. She was no dualist, no sepa- 
rator of sacred and profane, of petty and profound. 
All had significance and found their fitting place in 
her responsive soul. “‘One flower, one tree, one 
baby, one bird singing, or one little village would 
move her to love and praise as surely as a garden, a 
forest, a university, an orchestra, or a great city.” I 
~ never knew one who more fully, with William Blake, 


Could see a world in a grain of sand, 
And a heaven in a wild flower; 

Hold infinity in the palm of the hand, 
And eternity in an hour. 


Or with one of her own favorite poets, Henry 


Vaughan, could so— 


Feel through all this fleshly dress 
Bright shoots of everlastingness. 


Such exuberant many-sided life was of peculiar 
consequence in the work to which she was called. 
It was hers to set the pattern of a woman president 
of a woman’s college. In private life we prize woman 
not merely for her priestly qualities, but quite as 
much for her vivacity, swiftness of perception, ease 
in being pleased, and interested acceptance of what 
each moment brings. Should these fascinating fea- 
tures of traditional womanhood be retained on her 
entrance into official life, or should they be crowded 


150 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


out by the proprieties, decorums, and conformities 
to which woman is also prone? Alice Freemar 
showed which is the more admirable, which the more 
influential too. She never sank her own variable 
personality in the great official. She kept the child- 
like in the larger mind. By thus remaining truly a 
woman she protected womanliness among her stu- 
dents. Through her, freedom and naturalness per- 
vaded Wellesley. Bounteously original herself, she 
fostered whatever special quality those about her 
possessed and taught it to come forth with grace and 
helpfulness. Girls are easily crushed or starved. 
Nowhere is wealth of nature more important than in 
their leader. Perhaps, too, respect for temperamental 
differences was not at that time so generally prac- 
tised as it happily is now. 

Obviously, however, a great personality cannot 
be cut up into sections and listed. I may seem to have 
attempted something of the sort in successively set- 
ting down these modes of her personal influence. 
But that would be to disintegrate and falsify one 
who through all her variety was always the same 
beautiful whole. All I have desired is to trace a few 
of the channels through which that curious influence 
ran. Thus I have shown in what close contact with 
her girls she lived, though preserving always her dis- 
tinction and her power of instantaneous command ; 
how she summoned them to codperate with her, 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 151 


made them feel that it was their college no less than 
hers, and called on them to keep it vigorous and 
sweet; how in dealing with individuals she paid at- 
tention to whatever was excellent in them and let 
the poorer parts pretty much alone; how she treated 
them all as children of God who longed for a fuller 
embodiment of Him in their daily lives; how she even 
respected spontaneous nature and did not in the 
interest of a strained spirituality repress the happy 
waywardness of herself or her girls. But I am not 
so simple as to suppose that by this summary I 
have explained her, or that the methods here toil- 
somely enumerated can be codified in the next hand- 
book of pedagogics and used by any newly elected 
president. Properly speaking, these are not methods 
at all. They are merely her ways, the natural ex- 
pressions of a unique human being who was not 
afraid of herself or of obstacles, but ruled, loved, 
planned, enjoyed, and builded as best she could, with 
little help from past experience and with little con- 
sciousness of doing anything remarkable. Just nine 
years after she entered the university as a student 
she became president. When she retired, after her 
extraordinary, brief, but durable success, she was 
only a little older than the youngest college president 
who has ever taken office elsewhere. The mysterious 
power of characterful youth had more than counter- 
balanced the deficient age. Long ago Isaiah remarked 


152 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER — 


that ‘‘a child may die an hundred years old; but the | 
sinner being an hundred years old shall be accursed.” 

In this analysis of her work at Wellesley I have not 
paused to relate events of her own life. In reality 
there were none. Her life was merged in that of the 
college. One of her days was much like another. 
At Norumbega she took breakfast in her room, 
selecting then the hymn and Scripture for the day. 
Prayers followed at 8.30. Afterwards she attended 
to her mail and held office hours for consultation 
with students. These were usually prolonged through 
the morning, so that she rarely returned to her rooms 
at noon, unless to bring visitors, but took her luncheon 
in the main building. Afternoons were occupied 
with letters, callers, inspection of grounds, buildings, 
or departments, with interviews with teachers and 
parents, or with yet more students. Time too must 
be found for the occasional meetings of 'Trustees and 
Faculty, for seeing people in Boston, or for a public 
address. She tried to dine at home. When she did, 
she threw off all care and devoted herself more to 
the girls at her table than to her food, telling amusing 
stories and inciting those still better. After dinner 
she would take part in the merriment which usually 
preceded study hours. But quite as often she was 
unable to return to Norumbega till ten or eleven 
at night. Then she took a light lunch, read a 
while, — by preference poetry, — and was soon in 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 153 


bed. She was always a sound sleeper, and more 
dependent on sleep than food. 

Twice a year she tried to visit her parents in Michi- 
gan, and usually succeeded in giving them a few 
weeks. But having no dean to represent her at 
Wellesley, she was much confined there and through- 
out her presidency took only one considerable vaca- 
tion. This was in 1884. In that year an important 
International Conference on Education was held 
in London, to which she was appointed one of three 
American delegates. She had become much exhausted 
with work, and was advised that a voyage would 
invigorate her. In company with her father she saw 
England for the first time, addressing the Conference 
in a speech which Henry Sidgwick pronounced the 
best given there (Life and Letters, p. 384), and after- 
wards spending a few restful weeks at the English 
Lakes. In all, she was absent from Wellesley two 
months. 

In 1887 Columbia University, in New York City, 
at its centennial celebration, conferred on her the 
degree of Doctor of Letters; Union University, at 
its centennial in 1896, that of Doctor of Laws. 
She became a Doctor of Philosophy at Michigan 
in 1882. Since her death, in recognition of the work 
described in this chapter, Wellesley graduates have 
endowed their presidency with a fund which bears 
her name. 


154 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I add a few letters which have been sent me it 
further illustration of her Wellesley ways. 


LETTERS 


It is impossible for the girls of later days, of more 
perfect organization and more divided responsibil- 
ity, to realize how in that early time the whole college 
depended on this one personality. What she thought 
and said and did was the heart and centre of what 
the college thought and said and did. It would have 
been dangerous for one person to have so much power 
had not that person been Miss Freeman. What she 
was is best proved by what the place became. 
Through her administration Wellesley developed into 
a fully equipped college, thoroughly organized and 
efficiently conducted, known to all the world. How- 
ever much the Wellesley ideal may have grown 
through longer experience and wider opportunities, 
we shall always owe to Miss Freeman the establish- 
ment of the type. 


How she worked that year of her vice-presidency! 
Her interest in her own special department, that of 
history, could not be given up. She had planned 
a course for those brought that year to the college — 
teacher specials — and she must see it through; 
and she did. But how she toiled to conquer those 
old girls’ diffidence, their previous lack of any and 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 155 


every training! How she labored to wake them up to 
possibilities of study and research! How she strove 
to impart to them her zeal and enthusiasm ! 


-Her memory for names and faces was phenome- 
nal. On my second visit to her office I volunteered 
my name and was met with the quick response, 
“Yes, I know.” It was said that by the end of the 
first week of the college year she knew every one of 
her girls by name, and it was a pleasure to her to 
recognize them at all times, within doors or without. 


So blind she was to our shortcomings, so unerring 
in finding the good that was in us! Gentle, womanly, 
responsive, and enthusiastic, with a genius for friend- 
ship and affection, she has sent uncounted numbers 
of us from her presence inspired to do the thing 
which was at the highest limit of our powers. It 
was her unshakable belief in the best side of our 
natures that made her optimism inspiring. In the 
heat of her intense idealism every objecting, hinder- 
ing doubt was fused into a passion to do the work 
she knew we could do. Who of us will ever forget 
that flexible and endearing voice, or the beauty which 
poured from her smile, look, and gesture? 


_ [had never been away from home until I went to 
Wellesley, and I was desperately homesick. At noon 


156 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


the second day I wandered after luncheon into the 
centre and sat down on a stair by the palms. I wanted 
to die. Just then a troop of people came toward me 
in animated talk. One of them, a lady young and 
beautiful, was speaking most eagerly. As they passed 
me, she, without pausing in what she was saying, 
turned and poured her kind eyes right into mine. I 
felt a new life come in. It would be good to be any- 
where, I thought, if she were there. The next morn- 
ing I went to chapel. She was at the desk. I 
whispered to my neighbor and learned that it was the 
president. I was not homesick again. 


On my way to Wellesley for the first time I put 
myself under the care of Professor C. and went to 
the college with her. She took me to her own sitting- 
room, which she shared with Miss Freeman. The 
burst of welcome from Miss Freeman for her friend 
was irresistible and brought tears to my eyes. After 
the first greetings were over, Miss Freeman turned in 
her bright impulsive way to the little stranger, drew 
me into the circle, and began to help me off with my 
wraps. From the conversation, I gathered that she 
had not been well enough to ‘“‘go on” for a class- 
mate’s wedding and was eager to hear an account of 
it from Miss C. But this did not check her service to 
me. I was taken to her own bedroom, given fresh 
towels, and cared for in every way. It was such 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 157 


a gracious thing, that welcome of Miss Freeman at 
such a time to a little stranger who might so easily 
have been turned over to others! The rest of the 
time I was at Wellesley (I left the following Novem- 
ber, from illness) I saw Miss Freeman only at rare 
intervals. That one brief, bright glimpse is my per- 
manent remembrance of her. 


At one of the Faculty meetings in the first years of 
her presidency, when some grave academic questions 
were being discussed without much prospect of being 
brought to a conclusion, Miss Freeman was called 
to the door and found there the housekeeper of 
Dana Hall, who had insisted on seeing Miss Freeman. 
She had a carriage waiting to take her to Dana Hall 
to see the dress rehearsal of a French comedy which 
was soon to be given. The humor of the situation 
struck Miss Freeman. Returning to the room, she 
announced to the assembled professors that she had 
been called away on pressing business for an hour, 
and requested one of them to take the chair. Glee- 
fully she drove to Dana Hall, flashed in at the per- 
formance, laughed steadily for half an hour, and 
came back to the tired Faculty, blithe and breezy, 
to swing the discussion on to a prompt conclusion. 


Miss Freeman gave a series of talks to us seniors 
who intended to teach. They were frank discussions 


158 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


of the problems we should encounter and the right 
ways of meeting them. Nowadays they would prob- 
ably be “‘pedagogy ;”’ then they were simply “‘talks.”’ 
She always tried to show both sides of a picture. On 
one occasion she told of a letter she had just received 
from the head of a school, asking for a new teacher. 
The former one had broken her contract and left 
her position in the middle of the year, in order to be 
married. After condemning the lack of honor shown, 
and saying it was a case where “ 
her affections, became her weakness,’’ she went on 
to speak of the requirements demanded of the new 
candidate: she must be pleasing in person, highly 
trained intellectually, socially and morally an all- 
round example to her students, and would have a 
salary of $600. “‘I wrote the man,”’ she said, “‘that 
at present we have no six-hundred-dollar angel.” 


woman’s citadel, 


When ill tidings came to a fellow student it eased 
the aching hearts of her friends to know that Miss 
‘Freeman had gone to her. And when it fell to the 
president to report a piece of good fortune, one girl, 
I am sure, will never forget the hearty handshake 
and evident feeling with which she said, ‘‘I wanted 
to tell you myself how glad I am for you.” 

That indefinable quality called ‘‘magnetism” 
was in all her public utterances. People listened 
spellbound, variously ascribing their interest to her 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 159 


charm of manner or her brilliancy in command of 
language. She never permitted the daily chapel exer- 
cise to become irksome or distasteful. It meant much 
to her personally, and she made it much to those who 
listened. There are hymns which many old Wellesley 
girls never read or sing but the remembrance of Miss 
Freeman comes to them. The tenderness of the first 
epistle of John has ever meant more to them because 
she read from it so lovingly. Her simple, earnest 
words of prayer went through the day’s hard work 
and smoothed its perplexities. If she were absent 
from morning prayers, there was distinct disappoint- 
ment. And following from day to day the varied 
petitions which suited the needs of this large body of 
students, one wondered that no stereotyped phrases 
or even repetitions came from her lips. 

The portrait in the art gallery at Wellesley, ideally 
beautiful as it surely is, does not satisfy the old girls; 
it falls inevitably short of the remembrance of her, 
cherished for many years. 


The full-length portrait of Mrs. Palmer by Ab- 
bott Thayer, which Professor Horsford presented to 
Wellesley in 1890, embodies a beautiful ideal of purely 
womanly womanhood. The painting might be 
prized as a picture of the eternal feminine, and evi- 
dently was painted as such con amore by the artist. 
If it were simply of an artist’s model, and one did: 


160 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


not know the name of the subject, the canvas would 
be a charming one. The almost childlike expression 
of ingenuous appeal, the great eyes and sensitive 
mouth, the modesty of expression, full of dignity 
nevertheless, as are also the virginal white robes, the 
whole attitude as if of surprise and deprecation at 
being thus painted as a personage, are in reality not 
the artist’s dream, the fancy sketch of a type of 
feminine loveliness and sweetness, but the president 
of Wellesley College herself,—and every inch a 
president, — with intellectual powers trained to the 
utmost. 


I doubt if any one can appreciate her pictures who 
fails to supplement them with that instantaneous 
illumination which came to her face the moment she 
spoke. It was a kind of inner light which I have 
never seen on any other face of man or woman. 

When some girls had been talking foolishly, though 
apparently half aware that what they said was folly, 
she told them to stop, and added, “I’m glad I never 
was a girl.” 

She said, ‘Susan, you care too much about things; 
take them less seriously. The best of them won’t run 
away.” 

She told me, “‘’They hated me when I first came to 
Wellesley. I had charge of the work in the dining 
room and I made the girls attend to it. They had 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 161 


fallen into slack ways and resisted. But hate does n’t 
last long in good girls.” 


One day I went to her in great indignation: “The 
doctor says I must go home, and I don’t want to.” 
“‘Very well,” she said, “it is n’t I who send you. So 
don’t let us fall out about it. Sit down, talk it over, 
and let us see if we can plan to persuade the doctor 
to change his mind.” As it gradually appeared that 
I must go and must be quiet for a time, she said, “‘It 
requires more courage to meet the daily tasks of a 
dull life than to rise for a moment to a great occasion. 
Don’t you think it would be easier to submit to a 
surgical operation, and be done with it, than to sit 
still for a year and have some one stick pins into 
you?” 


A certain senior of my class was habitually late at 
chapel. For a time this passed unnoticed. One 
morning, after everybody else was seated and the 
hymn was about to be given out, this senior opened 
the door., Miss Freeman fixed her eyes on her, fol- 
lowed her with them all the way down the aisle until 
she took her place in the middle of the front row. 
“Now,” said she, “‘we will sing the 164th hymn.” 
The rebuke of her eyes and her emphasis were not to 
be forgotten. That was all she ever said about the 
inatter, but it did not occur again. 


162 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


One year many of us grew lazy and fell into the 
habit of sitting during the hymn. One morning 
Miss Freeman said quietly, but with her own look 
of humorous determination, “‘We will rise and sing 
the 23d hymn — ‘Stand up, stand up for Jesus.’” 
Of course we rose, and kept on rising. Equally of 
course we were diverted by the cleverness which 
made any chiding word unnecessary. 


Her self-control was instantaneous. As a little 
child, she had been frightened by seeing a cat in a 
fit, and she had ever after an instinctive aversion to 
cats. One morning at the chapel service, when she 
was leading the prayer with her eyes closed, a cat 
strayed upon the platform, jumped to her chair, and 
then to the desk upon her folded hands. Without the 
least quiver of voice to indicate that she had noticed 
anything, and without opening her eyes, she laid a 
hand upon the cat, pressed her gently down until the 
prayer was ended, then just before the last word 
quietly dropped her to the floor. 


She raised the money for the building of a new 
dormitory, but there was great delay in finishing it. 
The contractors were late, the workmen dawdled. 
Finally she went to the director of the works and 
quietly said, ““We move into this building on such a 
day.’ He answered, “Impossible. It will not be 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 163 


finished.” ‘‘We shall be sorry to inconvenience your 
workmen, but we move on that day.” The director 
stormed, made remarks about “ignorant women, 
unsexing themselves by trying to boss men.” But 
wonders were accomplished, and on the day in ques- 
tion we moved in with comparatively little left to be 
done. 


An Englishman came to the college one day. After 
inspecting it pretty fully and admiring its beauty, 
completeness, and cheerful effect on its students, he 
was still perplexed by its strangeness and by the. 
readjustment of social conditions which it seemed to 
imply. ‘‘But, Miss Freeman,” he inquired, “will not 
the four years here interfere with a girl’s chances?” 
**Possibly they will,’ Miss Freeman answered, “‘her 
chances with men of a certain type. But I don’t 
believe she will mind.” 


Walking with her once, I said, ‘‘Miss Freeman, 
there is a quality I long to possess more than any 
other, and that is tact. Probably it is inborn. Cer- 
tainly it is very difficult to acquire. But you are the 
most tactful person I ever knew. Can’t you give me 
some hint to help me a little toward tactfulness ?” 
Unassumingly she disclaimed any such power. She 
wished she had it. She had tried to get it, and had 
been encouraged to do so by a former teacher. A 


164 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


teacher of her girlhood had told her about the impor- 
tance of tact and had said that a good way to gain it 
was to care more about the person we are dealing with, 
and the end we seek, than about gaining that end by 
our special means. In working with others, he 
believed we often reach our end soonest if we are 
willing to set aside the way we know to be best and 
let others take the way they like best. So long as they 
are moving in our direction,and we are keeping close 
to them, he thought we ought to be satisfied. 


My mother likes to recall the Sunday vesper ser- 
vice just before I graduated. Mother was a really 
great singer, with a reputation in England for ora- 
torio solo work. She sang always, whenever she 
could give pleasure to anybody. The college kept her 
pretty busy during her week there. That Sunday 
night Miss Freeman sat far back in the chapel. As 
mother left the room, she came, like an impulsive 
child, and threw her arms around mother’s neck and 
told her tearfully what the music had meant to her. 
I have always thought that her power lay partly in 
her presentation of the child in connection with the 
forceful woman. 


My first glimpse of her was in my senior year. 
College did not begin till the morrow, and we were 
having a royal time over home boxes and summer 


THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 165 


news, when some one reported that we had a new 
professor of history, that she was to be our senior 
class officer, and that now was a propitious time to 
make her acquaintance and test her quality. A dele- 
gation waited on her and brought her, youthful as 
the youngest of us, bright, alert, charming — her 
fine, soft, brown hair combed back from her brow 
to a dainty coil behind, escaping in waves, making 
merry with itself here and there, her round, full face 
shining with delight to be counted one of us. She 
won us then and there, and forever. 

I did not see her from that time, when she appeared 
in all her youthful beauty and freshness, until after 
the first year of her presidency. It was only three 
years as men count time, but many years had elapsed 
if we reckon what had been accomplished. A greater 
Wellesley had been evolved, and our lady showed 
marks of the effort.. I looked at her twice before I, 
her warm and intimate companion of three years 
before, recognized her. Her hair was smoothly 
parted. She had donned some sort of lace arrange- 
ment; for at twenty-seven and as president of a col- 
lege one needs external signs of age — though all this 
was soon abandoned. The evolution of the new 
Wellesley had drawn lines over the round, mobile face, 
lines of character, of strength, lines to be welcomed, 
for they stood for development and growth. She 
was changed and Wellesley was changed. She had 


166 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


reached out her hand and spanned the distance 
between Wellesley and Boston, between Wellesley 
and Cambridge. We were no longer sufficient to our- 
selves, shut away from the larger life at our doors, 
narrow, constrained, dogmatic, exclusive. At a 
bound our infancy was left behind. It is marvelous 
to look back upon the inspired intelligence with 
which she guided Wellesley through that rapid 


development. 


Some of the loudest mourners over her departure 
from Wellesley were the little children of the neigh- 
borhood, for whom from time to time she used to 
hold “‘baby parties” on the college green. One little 
fellow of four uttered his lamentation so freshly that 
she cherished the remembrance of it. When his 
mother told him that Miss Freeman was going away 
from Wellesley, he broke into convulsive sobs; nor 
could he be quieted with assurances that she was not 
going far away, but would be very near, at Cambridge, 
where he might sometimes see her. ‘“‘No, no, 
mama!” he cried, ‘“You don’t understand. It is n’t 
the farness nor the nearness that I mind. It’s the 
never-the-sameness.”’ 


Every place connected with her is filled with her 
joyous vitality. Here I see her writing letters, running 
down the hall; can catch her laugh, and her excite< 





MONUMENT IN MEMORY OF MRS. PALMER 


Designed by Daniel Chester French 
Erected in Wellesley College Chapel by 
Edwin Hale Abbot 


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THE WELLESLEY PRESIDENCY 167 


ment over the interests of others. I recall how, when 
I went into a room where she was, she seemed the 
whole thing; and that when she went out, there was 
nothing left. As often as I think of her, Iam ashamed 
of not being always hopeful and happy. 


We loved her for the loving thoughts which sped 
Straight from her heart, until they found their goal 
In some perplexed or troubled human soul, 

And broke anew the ever living bread. 

We loved the mind courageous, which no dread 
Of failure ever daunted, whose control 
Of gentleness all opposition stole; 

We loved herself and all the joy she shed. 

O Leader of the Leaders! Like a light 
Thy life was set, to counsel, to befriend. 

Thy quick and eager insight seized the right 
And shared the prize with bounteous hand and free. 
Fed from the fountains of infinity 

Thy life was service, having love to spend. 

PRESIDENT CAROLINE HAZARD. 


Xx 


MARRIAGE 


In his delightful “Theory of the Moral Senti- 
ments” Adam Smith points out that each of us has 
certain emotions so entirely his own that to talk of 
them in public is improper. Suitable enough in them- 
selves, they are not suitable for conversation. For 
the law of good manners is dictated by the possi- 
bility of sympathy. To express to another person 
feelings which are so little his that he cannot fully 
sympathize with them is to be rude to him and inde- 
cent as regards oneself. With this principle cultivated 
society is substantially in accord and sharply resents 
disclosures of private joys and sorrows. It is true 
we give license to poets and novelists, and praise 
them in proportion as they reveal the intimacies of 
the human heart. But it is the universal human 
heart, and not the special operations of John’s or 
Susan’s, which they reveal. Only as one’s own expe- 
rience is typical of that of others should it be made 
public. 

That marriage is a matter more of private than of 
public concern is obvious; for while its larger emo- 
tions and circumstances are as generally apprehen- 


MARRIAGE 169 


sible as other events of the day, these are tinged 
throughout with what Adam Smith calls “‘a peculiar 
turn of imagination,” which is the lover’s own and 
cannot be shared without a kind of impiety. I should 
naturally, therefore, pass Miss Freeman’s marriage 
by with a bare record, if it did not present certain 
typical features and involve problems of general 
public concern. It excited much debate at the time, 
and probably influenced more people for good or ill 
than any other event of her life. Its hopes, courage, 
and sacrifices show the largeness of her woman- 
hood. These aspects of it I must set forth. A bio- 
graphy which attempts to trace the inner growth of 
that beautiful character must give to this a central 
place. 

Professor Horsford of Cambridge was an early 
_ friend of Mr. Durant’s. He became chairman of the 
board of visitors of the college and one of its most 
frequent benefactors. Over Miss Freeman he 
watched with a father’s tenderness. To his house 
she often came, and largely through him she be- 
came known in Cambridge. Her administration of 
Wellesley was much admired there. I had heard 
her praises sung for several years before I met her at 
Professor Horsford’s house in 1884. In 1886, when 
I was publishing some papers on the elective sys- 
tem, I came to know her better, especially as in that 
year I gave a course of lectures at Wellesley. During 


170 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


the summer of 1886 Mrs. Governor Claflin and she 
visited Boxford, my country home. From that time 
our intimacy ripened rapidly until on her thirty- 
second birthday, February 21, 1887, I brought her 
an engagement ring. With characteristic audacity 
she insisted on wearing it at once. When at our next 
meeting I asked if her girls had not remarked it, she 
said they had on that very evening; but that when 
she had told them it was her birthday and this was 
one of her birthday gifts, she started a discussion 
over their respective ages and the subject of the ring 
disappeared. It did not disappear from her finger, 
however, necessary though concealment was. We 
both understood how badly the college and her work 
would be upset if our relations were talked of before 
the end of the term. I therefore stayed away from 
Wellesley, and nobody, not even the members of 
our two families, learned until summer that the new 
tie was formed. Immediately after Commencement 
Miss Freeman called a meeting of the Trustees and 
laid the whole matter before them. 

My hope had been that she would be set free from 
Wellesley at once, and the wedding take place during 
the summer. In view of this she had already made 
some preliminary inquiries about a successor, in- 
quiries which had little other result than to show 
how narrow was the range of choice. But the Trus- 
tees could not be brought to an immediate decision. 


MARRIAGE 171 


To lose Miss Freeman was in their view to imperil 
Wellesley, and naturally enough they wished for time 
to look about. They urged her to remain one year 
more, during which a successor might be sought, 
while both the public mind and the internal affairs 
of the college would become adjusted to the new 
order. From their point of view the plan was wise. 
Miss Freeman’s devotion to duty, too, answered the 
appeal of their fears and made any defence of her 
own advantage distressing. I remember how we 
went driving on one of those perplexing days, and 
how as we passed farther into the solitary woods her 
spirits broke into girlish glee over the prospect of 
our home. She sang, laughed, jested, spoke low. 
Suddenly our road left the woods, and we found our- 
selves again on the shore of Lake Waban, with the 
college in full sight across the water. Her merriment 
stopped. Her face sobered and soon showed positive 
anguish. “‘How can I?” she said after a minute’s 
silence. I could not bring the glad mood back. 
Sadly and with few more words we drove into the 
college grounds. Unhappily, at a time when this call 
of the college was especially strong, I gave way and 
agreed to let her remain in service until Christmas. 
It was barbarous to abandon her thus to the wolves. 
The damage done her health by those cruel months 
fasted for years; and in December Professor Helen 
A. Shafer was appointed her successor, — the same 


ae ifs 4 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


excellent person who had been designated in July. 
My futile repentance I here record. 

But graver questions than that of date were involved 
in our marriage. Miss Freeman’s youth and beauty 
ruling so skilfully the fairyland of Wellesley had 
often brought her the title of “The Princess,” and 
Tennyson’s poem of that name had become asso- 
ciated with her work. Now its problem, private 
fulfilment against public service, was brought widely 
into debate. There were heated partisans on each 
side. On the one hand it was strongly argued that 
in proportion as one develops capacity for public 
things he should treat his personal desires as matters 
of little moment. Others should treat them so too. 
Priests cannot marry, and kings only those who are 
likely to promote the interests of their land. When 
a headstrong king resigns his crown to marry a beg- 
gar maid, it makes a pretty story, but a justly exas- 
perated people. It is not tyranny to regulate the 
marriage of soldiers and sailors. Possibly artists 
should remain single. Responsibility carries with it 
trusts which cannot be cast away at will. Civilization 
rests upon dedicated lives, lives which acknowledge 
obligation not to themselves or to other single per- 
.sons, but to the community, to science, to art, to a 
cause. Especially base was it for one who had proved 
her power to win an unwilling public to look with 
favor on the education of women now to snatch at 


MARRIAGE 173 


the selfish seclusion of home, and so confirm the 
popular fancy that a woman will drop the weighti- 
est charge if enticed with a bit of sentiment. What 
too must be thought of the man who would tempt 
her from eminence to obscurity ? 

Such distrustful remarks hurt Miss Freeman 
cruelly, and she was correspondingly grateful for the 
meny kind words and letters which brought approval 
of her step. The Trustees and professors were 
especially generous. They understood her and now, 
with but one or two exceptions, rejoiced in her gain, 
regardless of their own loss. Yet to some even of 
them, as to many of the public, it was not at once 
evident why marriage should break her career and 
leave mine intact. Why should not I give way rather 
than she? Harvard is at no great distance from 
Wellesley. I had found my way across for injury; 
why not now for benefit ? Many Harvard instructors 
live in neighboring towns. One might go to and fre 
each day from Wellesley. Or, better still, why not 
resign at Harvard and join her in the presidency? 
Then home and occupation would alike express our 
union. A friend of Wellesley offered to build us a 
house within the grounds there, and to raise a fund 
for the joint salary, though this was hardly necessary ; 
her salary being at the time $4000 and mine but 
$3500, we should have been in easier circumstances 
at Wellesley than in Cambridge. 


174 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I have stated these adverse criticisms somewhat 
in detail because they all seem to me important. 
With most of them I am in hearty sympathy; indeed 
I was so even then, as appears in a letter recently 
sent me from Mrs. Claflin’s papers and printed at 
the close of this chapter. But though in that letter 
some considerations are given which might well 
lessen Wellesley’s sense of loss, I think I had better 
state here more systematically the reasons which at 
the time we thought set us free to act as love prompted. 
Our problem having been recognized as a somewhat 
general one, the grounds of our decision may properly 
have some general interest. 

In the view of both of us Miss Freeman’s work at 
Wellesley was already substantially done. In an- 
other six years she could accomplish little more than 
any creditable successor. She had set the pattern, 
and quiet growth according to it was what was now 
required. Little further constructive work was at 
the moment possible. From the dying hands of the 
founder she had received the rough outlines of a col- 
jege. With consummate skill and originality she 
had set these in order, and filled them with such 
ideals as would insure their ultimate strength. But 
she was confined to a pioneer epoch, and its very 
conditions cut her off from sharing in the anticipated 
results. No college can be created at a word; it is a 
thing of growth. Especially is it true of a college 


MARRIAGE 175 


started by a single founder that after its first active 
years there comes a considerable period of quiescence. 
Until the personal stamp has worn away, the public 
rightly will not adopt it. The Trustees selected by 
the founder must die, his Faculty be replaced, the 
resources of his fortune prove evidently insufficient, 
his private methods of administration go through a 
searching criticism, and he himself sink into a hazy 
and mythical figure, before the community will re- 
gard his college as really its own and a new group 
of givers be gathered for its support. All this requires 
time. It seemed to Miss Freeman and myself that 
having faithfully carried the college through its 
pioneer period, she might be discharged from its 
waiting time; that the length of this might even be 
diminished and the coming of a period of expansion 
be hastened by the withdrawal of one so closely asso- 
ciated with its founder. Much of the aid she could 
now give might be given as well in private life as from 
the president’s chair. Of course she remained on the 
Board of Trustees, and was a close friend of the 
succeeding presidents. 

But it might well be urged that even during the 
waiting years, though further enlargement was im- 
possible, her ennobling presence could ill be spared. 
I thought, however, that so subordinate a benefit to 
the college should properly give way to the demands 
of her health. It will be remembered that she broke 


176 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 
down during her first year at Wellesley. While she 


learned much from that experience, she had never 
been able to adopt the more indulgent modes of life 
which she knew to be necessary for full recovery. 
Her office claimed all her time and much more than 
her strength, allowing her only a single vacation in 
six years. The duties of a president are under the 
best conditions enormous, and present themselves 
with little regard to the needs of him who executes 
them. ‘They crushed her two successors more quickly 
than herself. To-day we have learned better means 
of protection than were known then. President 
Hazard justly writes, “Twenty years ago there were 
fewer devices for labor-saving. Stenographers were 
not yet in the field, secretaries still wrote long-hand. 
So with scanty help, working day and night, living in 
the building with her girls, having them constantly 
in close association with her, giving unsparingly of 
herself, Miss Freeman lived her life.” I did not 
think it safe that such exhaustion should continue. 
It was better even for the college that she should help 
it henceforth in other ways. 

Obviously too these conditions cut me off from 
joining her at Wellesley; for while, if I were there, I 
could undoubtedly relieve her of much, I could not 
break up those habits of whole-hearted devotion 
which were at once her glory and her darger. But 
of course I had no idea of closing her career. Those 


MARRIAGE 177 


who protested against this were quite right. Talents 
so obviously meant for mankind no one had a right 
to seize for himself. “‘Not mine, I never called 
her mine.” Only on condition that I could give her 
enlargement, not confinement, was I justified in 
accepting her sacrifice and bearing her away to my 
home. Yet I thought our critics a little dull not to 
perceive the vast increase of powers which love, 
home, ease, and happiness bring. Until these funda- 
mental needs are supplied, everybody in my judg- 
ment is only half himself. It is absurd then to look 
on these with suspicion and exalt a public career in 
contrast, when these are the very means by which 
that becomes rich and strong. The public person is 
not one being and the private another; for the worth 
of public leadership is pretty exactly proportioned 
to the wealth of the personal nature. So it had 
hitherto been in her case. To carry that wealth still 
nearer to completeness was my happy office. Presi- 
dent Eliot’s words are weighty : — 

‘After six years of masterly work at Wellesley 
College, in which she exhibited the keenest intelli- 
gence, large executive ability, and a remarkable 
capacity for winning affection and respect, she laid 
down these functions, married at the age of thirty- 
two, and apparently entered on a wholly new career. 
Alice Freeman thus gave the most striking testimony 
she could give of her faith in the fundamental social 


178 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


principle that love between man and woman, and 
the family life which results therefrom, afford for 
each sex the conditions of its greatest usefulness and 
honor, and of its supreme happiness. The opponents 
of the higher education of women had always argued 
that such education would tend to prevent marriage 
and to dispossess the family as the cornerstone of 
society. Alice Freeman gave the whole force of her 
conspicuous example to disprove that objection. She 
illustrated in her own case the supremacy of love and 
of family life in the heart of both man and woman.” 

IT have said that I weakly agreed to have Miss 
Freeman remain at Wellesley until December. Each 
Sunday of those autumn months I spent with her 
there, becoming more fully acquainted with the col- 
lege and the life which she was soon to lay down. In 
these last months she was doubly anxious to do her 
utmost for her beloved college, and everybody who 
had any subject on which she might be consulted with 
advantage took this opportunity to see her. Girls 
and colleagues hastened to get one final draught of 
inspiration. Love is merciless, and often crowds so 
close to its adored object as almost to trample it 
down. Then too the conflicting claims of home and 
college tore her night and day. A severer period of 
toil she never experienced. Fortunately a limit was 
fixed by the Harvard Christmas recess, extending 
from December 23 to January 3. The first of these 


MARRIAGE 179 


days, falling in 1887 on Friday, was set for the wed- 
ding. She had decided to be married at the house 
of Governor and Mrs. Claflin, 65 Mt. Vernon Street, 
Boston, which had been one of her dearest places of 
refuge since she first came to Wellesley. Her par- 
ents’ home was too far away. As I was living in 
chambers, Cambridge was out of the question; and 
she could not get rid of a feeling that to be married 
in the Wellesley Chapel would give her personal 
affairs excessive prominence. The wedding was at 
half-past eleven in the morning. Up to that hour of 
the previous night she worked in her college office. 


LETTERS 
Boxrorp, July 8, 1887. 

Dear Mrs. Carin: 

_ I hear from Miss Freeman that she has told you 
of our engagement. I am very glad she has. You 
would naturally be one of the first whom we should 
wish to tell. You have known us as few others 
among the Trustees have, and in the excited discus- 
sions that are to come there will be plenty of need of 
clear knowledge, in order to make people turn away 
from their hot momentary feeling and consider the 
real facts in the case. This great service of keeping 
people just and clear-headed you can now do for 
Miss Freeman. She will need such protection. She 
is greatly strained already. You know how sensitive 


180 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


she is to the disapproval of those she loves, even 
when she sees that their disapproval springs from 
nothing better than half knowledge. ‘To hint that she 
is abandoning duty for selfish gains is to cut her 
with a knife. We all perceive that she is incapable 
of doing such a thing, but her pain is just as great 
as if she were. 

On the other hand, that people will abuse me I 
anticipate, and I think it very proper that they 
should. Being of tolerably tough material, I can 
stand abuse very comfortably. In the place of a 
Wellesley Trustee, I dare say I should denounce this 
thievish Harvard professor pretty roundly. And yet 
I hold that at the present moment I am one of the 
great benefactors of Wellesley, one of the few who 
clearly see the direction in which its prosperity lies. 
Let me explain the paradox. 

Great causes and great institutions are generally 
best founded, or guided through crises, by a single 
leader. ‘They are embodiments of him. His is their 
inspiration and his their wisdom. The service of 
them is personal allegiance. To him everything is 
referred, and his will takes for the time the place of 
all more minute law and organization. Wellesley 
has fortunately had this experience, first under Mr. 
Durant and then under the general of his choice. 
But the danger which besets such an institution is 
obvious: it does not acquire a life of its own. Every- 


MARRIAGE 181 


thing is staked on the single leader; and even when 
that leader is perfect, there is something lacking in 
the spontaneous vigor of the separate parts. It is 
beautiful to see how the greatest of all leaders per- 
ceived this and said to his disciples, ‘It is expedient 
for you that I go away, although because I go sor- 
row hath filled your hearts.”’ He knew that fulness 
of life could come about only in that way. 

Now you know that ever since I have been ac- 
quainted with you, and before I loved Miss Freeman, 
I pointed out that this must be the next stage in 
Wellesley’s growth. I held that it was now about 
ready for it. There is always something green and 
immature in an institution that hangs much on a 
single person. It is in unstable equilibrium. Solid 
organizations welcome great men, but are not de- 
pendent on them. A Western college may die if it 
does not get a suitable president; the great. univer- 
sities of Germany change their rectors every two 
years, and are totally unaffected. 

You and I believe in Miss Freeman’s work. We 
think it has been strong and far-seeing. We hold 
that she has set the college on the right paths and 
has not only done herself, but has shown others how 
to do. If this is our belief, we have nothing to be 
afraid of in the present change. The time of test- 
ing her work is come, and we can be calm, sure 
that whatever the temporary hardship, here is an 


182 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


opportunity for the college to take a great step for- 
ward. 

You will readily suppose that in my mind these 
are no new thoughts. For Wellesley I am something 
like the enthusiast that you are, and this ennobling 
friendship of mine with Miss Freeman could not 
deepen from year to year and month to month with- 
out often calling me to consider what right I had to 
such a share in her. The advantage I have must be 
the advantage of the public too. Unless I had be- 
lieved it might be so, I would have turned away. I 
do believe it; and as I come nearer, I believe it more 
and more. I now know — what I did not at first — 
that those who clamor for her remaining longer at 
Wellesley, while believing themselves public-spirited 
are doing a cruelly selfish thing. ‘They are asking her 
to give what she has already spent, and spent too 
for their sakes. If they really love her and are grate- 
ful for her work, they will beg her to leave. My 
chief fear is that it is already too late. If I had never 
appeared, she could not go on two years longer. But 
my hope is that by constant watchfulness and by the 
warm strength of a home — which to her, since she 
is a human being, is no less precious than it is to 
those who will blame her —I may do something to 
restore powers already seriously shaken and may 
succeed in making of her a great buttress, a strong 
outside support, for Wellesley through many years: 


MARRIAGE 183 


It is pleasant to think too that my own opportunities 
for helping Wellesley will now be much increased. 

But these things are not the main object of my 
letter. I am really writing an invitation. I want you 
to visit me here a week from Saturday, and to bring 
Miss Freeman with you. Here we will have more of 
those restful days which grow only in these pleasant 
fields. The past months have brought some hard- 
ships, among them these: that for the sake of the 
college I thought I had no right to visit Wellesley — 
which I saw but once between March and Commence- 
ment — and then that for the same reason I have 
been forced into silence with my friends. Now there 
is a glad relief from restraint. Alice and I have been 
perfectly free in expressing to you our interest in one 
another while we were only friends; and now that 
our friendship has gone through and through us, we 
want you with us still; for you know as few others 
can how exceptional is our union — occupations 
and tastes and principles and experience already 
harmonized before we marry, and our powers suf- 
ficiently unlike to give us the wealth of diversity. I 
am sure that you who are not afraid of sentiment 
will, if with some momentary regrets, still give us your 
hearty approval and, as I hope, your presence here. 

With warm regard, I am, 

Sincerely yours, 
G. H. PALMER. 


184 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


You ought not to be abroad this bright summer 
Sunday, but here where we could talk to our heart’s 
content of many, many things. Your good letter 
made me sorry that you have met disappointments 
everywhere in your wanderings, but I hope you have 
found the clear air invigorating for your sister. ‘Then 
I am sure you will be contented. I shall not go 
abroad this summer. I need the rest badly, and 
ought to go and take it immediately. But perhaps I 
can do better. It is of this that I want to write you 
to-day. So go away by yourself before you read my 
next page. It is cruel that I cannot be near to com- 
fort you as I talk, because I think you will be very 
sorry, possibly angry; but sometime you will know 
that I am doing the best thing I can possibly do. For 
I am going to marry — sometime — and to marry 
Professor Palmer. Yes, dear, I know you think I 
ought not to leave the college, and are terribly 
grieved. You asked me once about him, but then we 
were not engaged. As soon as I can, I tell you; and I 
believe you will really be glad to have me take a 
quieter, longer life than I could otherwise have, a 
happier and a wiser one. Remember this when you 
come home and do not refuse to know my professor, 
but learn to love him for his own true sake — not 
merely for mine. And won’t you read German with 
me this year? I must revive my languages as fully 
as possible, for I suppose the following summer we 
go abroad. 


MARRIAGE 185 


I am just dressed, dear father, for the first time 
since Monday; and now it is Thursday afternoon. 
An intermittent fever has got hold of me and a bad 
cough, especially nights and mornings. I had no 
appetite, and the constant feeling of weakness wore 
me out and sent me to bed last Monday. Now I am 
better, and I want to talk about plans for the summer 
instead of about myself all the time. My engagement 
is announced, and I have promised the Trustees to 
remain as president for a part of next year. So you 
will be pleased, quite satisfied I hope. I make up a 
bundle of these nice letters which have come from 
all over the country and share them with you. H. 
writes, “‘Ah, if we might have Professor Palmer here 
at Wellesley!” That is what so many are saying 
~—all except the Harvard and Cambridge people — 
urging him to come to the college with me. : 

I wonder where you would like me to be married 
when the time comes. All his friends and the college 
people will wish the wedding here, for few could go 
so far as Michigan. But I would never consent to be 
married at the college unless every member of my 
family could be present, and I am not sure that I 
should like it even then. I can see that I shall be 
urged to let Wellesley have the pleasure of the wed- 
ding. Mr. Palmer would like to have it in the 
pleasant autumn weather, when it is so much easier 
to begin housekeeping than in the winter. Could you 


186 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


come East by that time? Yet our house in Saginaw 
is so pretty I should really like to have the wedding 
there, where it would be less conspicuous. A few 
people would like to come from here. Tell me what 


you think. 


I snatch this little minute on the train going to 
Boston in order to get a word with you, my child. 
Can you read what I would say ? On Friday morning, 
December 23, I am to be married in Boston, just 
Mr. Palmer’s family and my own present. A few of 
our dearest friends are to be invited to meet us 
immediately afterwards. I wish my little girl could 
be there and meet her new father. But I will answer 
now the questions you have in mind. I am to be 
married in a long white mozre dress, with point lace 
and veil, —to be a real bride, you see, — and my 
reception dresses are dark red velvet, white lace, 
white silk, and yellow satin. We go to housekeeping 
immediately in Cambridge. 


It is now settled that we sail the first of July, and 
remain fifteen months abroad. I am sure the deci- 
sion is wise, but I have many regrets, I love some 
people and colleges in and about Boston so much 
that this long absence is not coveted. Yet we both 
need to seize the opportunity at once. If we wait a 
year, with so many frail relatives on each side, we 


MARRIAGE 187 


may not be able to go at all. We can go now, leaving 
all our friends in fair comfort and health; and a year 
hence return from rest and study a good deal better 
fitted for daily work. So I am making my farewell 
visit at home, leaving my husband to cope with a new 
cook alone. Why will good servants get married ? 


1888, December 23, 11.30 a. m. Dear Mrs. Claflin: 
You are the one who must share this hour. Do you 
know that just a year ago my George was taking me 
down the stairs into your beautiful rooms to make 
me a wife? So I must come back and end the perfect 
year as I began it, under the light of your smile. No 
one of us knew then how blessed a year was opening 
before two people. I wish I might sit down in your 
own room now and show you the symbol which has 
_just been put on my hand. It is a great shining opal, 
set round with diamonds. When G. and I were in 
Paris four months ago we were strolling one night, 
looking into the jeweller’s fascinating windows, and 
discovered an opal ring with tints of green and gold, 
richer and deeper than we had ever seen before. We 
looked at it with delight and often afterwards 
searched for it, but could never find it again. Fancy 
how my breath was taken away when just now that 
identical ring was put on my finger! That base 
deceiver had helped me look for it many a time after 
it was safely hidden in his pocket. And now here it 


188 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


is, with the splendor of the sun at its heart and 
changing into fresh beauty whenever I look at it. 
That, dear friend, is like married life, is n’t it? All 
things made new every morning and evening. And 
it is good to have you so tied in with our greatest 
days. I think of you in connection with Boxford’s 
sweet peace, with Wellesley’s eager life, with all our 
married joy and work together. Let us see each other 
very often when I come home. 


Xx 


SABBATICAL YEARS 


TureExE out of the four divisions into which Mrs, 
Palmer’s life naturally falls have now been described. 
First there was the period of Family Life, before she 
had acquired a life of her own; then that of Culture, 
when from early girlhood to university graduation 
she was busy with her own development; thirdly, that 
of Service, when the daily demands of other people 
dictated every act. Now with her marriage begins a 
period of Self-Expression, when she came to the full 
use of all her powers and in their joyous outgo so 
combined service and culture that it was impossible 
to say whether she labored for the benefit of others 
or for the mere fun of the thing. The latter was her 
own view. As she woke in the morning she would 
often say, ““Here’s another great rich day!” ‘The 
glowing world was before her, and with it she was in 
complete accord. I have seen a puzzled look come 
over her face when her self-denial was praised. That 
was not the side from which she approached her 
duties; interest in them was her prompter. I some- 
times think she was hardly more unselfish than 
ethers; only her selfishness excluded none of the 


190 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


affairs of those about her, but found its material 
there. From her earliest childhood there was stored 
in this exuberant and sympathetic nature provision 
for the union of aims which often conflict. It grew 
through all her bleak years, but reached its most 
exquisite and abundant fruitage only after she found 
herself in a sheltered home. There, though she still 
did the work of several men, bits of quiet could be 
interposed, her health was guarded and grew firm, 
the large range and variety of her influence prevented 
monotonous fatigue, and the happiness of her own 
dancing heart went forth to gladden all she did. 
Through strenuous seasons she had already gained 


The reason firm, the temperate will, 
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill. 


She now went on her joyous way exulting in their 
exercise. 

During the spring of 1888 we occupied a furnished 
house in Cambridge, where Mrs. Palmer was 
warmly welcomed. Study was thrown to the winds; 
we devoted ourselves to resting, to becoming better 
acquainted with each other and with our neighbors. 
In a university town every newcomer must eat his 
way in, and during the ccurse of his adoption as 
a member of the household attend a kindly series of 
dinners and teas. This process of making acquaint- 
ance was in our case begun by a luncheon in Mrs. 


SABBATICAL YEARS 191 


Palmer’s honor given by President and Mrs. Eliot, 
and attended solely by the Harvard Faculty and their 
wives. Similar festivities filled our evenings. Our 
afternoons were occupied with calls; I remember 
making three hundred and forty in the course of the 
season. Mondays, the weekly holidays of Wellesley, 
we opened our door to Mrs. Palmer’s former asso- 
ciates. Making a business of society was so novel to 
me that I was interested in watching its different 
effects on Mrs. Palmer and myself. For a time it 
puzzled me to know why at the end of a day of it she 
came out fresh and I exhausted. But I soon dis- 
covered that she had all the time been enjoying 
people, while I had been trying to enjoy them. For 
her, people always seemed necessary to enable her 
to breathe easily, their manifold interests to be her 
daily food. As she gradually adjusted herself to my 
studious ways, and I to her social ones, there came a 
double gain. 

But her obvious need after so many years of labor 
was entire rest and change of scene. If so vital a 
creature could be rendered torpid for a time, she 
would be sure to come forth with heightened powers. 
For just such periodic renewal there exists a happy 
provision at Harvard, this being the first university 
to establish the Sabbatical Year. Each seventh year, 
it is arranged, a professor may take to himself on 
half pay. He need not teach or study, he may travel 


192 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


or remain at home, he may even altogether decline 
the proffered vacation and go on with customary 
work and salary; but the opportunity is given to 
freshen and enrich himself, and by doing so to enrich 
his subsequent teaching. Only five years before, I 
had enjoyed such a vacation, but the authorities 
of the University, perceiving Mrs. Palmer’s need, 
offered me another prematurely. I accepted it; we 
went abroad in June, remaining away for more than 
a year. ‘Three such Sabbatical Years we had, in 1888, 
1895, and 1902, important periods in Mrs. Palmer’s 
life, yet interruptions of its current. Being detach- 
able from the rest of her story, I will treat them all 
here indiscriminately, in connection with the first. 
Nor will I set down their incidents chronologically, 
but rather indicate the general methods of recupera- 
tion pursued in them and thus attempt to exhibit in 
its lighter moments a character which has hitherto 
appeared too sedate. : 

Mrs. Palmer was an excellent loafer. I had some 
misgivings on this point at first, remembering how 
perniciously habituated she was to industry. In 
going abroad I felt that my chief object must be to 
teach her to eat, sleep, and loaf. But she required 
no teaching, and took to all these useful arts instinct- 
ively. In fact they had been the secret of her past 
endurance. She never worried. When a job was 
completed, or not yet ready to attack, she turned her 


SABBATICAL YEARS 193 


mind to other things. During her severest times at 
Wellesley she slept soundly and immediately. Once 
in later life, after a public address, when she was 
about to take a train for another engagement, a worn 
woman pressed forward with the question, “Mrs. 
Palmer, how are you able to do so much more than 
other persons?” The time only permitted a witty 
epigram, but she packed it with truth. “‘Because,” 
she answered, “‘I have n’t any nerves nor any con- 
science, and my husband says I have n’t any back- 
bone.” A prosaic letter came the next day inquiring 
whether one could altogether dispense with a con- 
Science. She could, when work was over. Into a 
holiday no schoolgirl of twelve ever carried a lighter 
heart. Her very aptitudes for business fitted her also 
for recreation, since whatever was appropriate to the 
-moment, even idleness, got at once her full attention. 
Such intentional methods of escaping responsibility 
were greatly assisted too by the native nimbleness 
of her physical senses, her response to natural beauty, 
the vivacious interest she took in every moving thing, 
and her disposition to fill small matters with romance, 

The aim then of our Sabbatical Years not being 
intellectual or social profit, we sought seclusion and 
avoided sight-seeing. Seldom did we go out of an 
evening, and we carried no letters of introduction. 
Europe we took as our playground. We should have 
remained at home if anywhere in America we could 


194 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


have escaped business and people; but against these 
attractive enemies of the worn-out man there is na 
barrier like the ocean. We accordingly moved about 
as little as possible; and if we ever went to popular 
resorts, we went there out of season. We did not 
visit Norway or Russia, Asia, Africa, or Spain — all 
these parts requiring a large amount of travel. Our 
taste turned to places where greater enjoyment could 
be had with smaller fatigue. Rome, too, we gener- 
ally avoided, as the place where all the world is 
engaged in afternoon tea. Our chief demand was 
domestic comfort, with a minor welcome for pleasing 
scenes or handy galleries and libraries. Sunshine we 
also desired, but learned how rarely it can be had in 
a European winter. That the sun works throughout 
the year is apparently a discovery of Columbus, our 
America showing between its wintry storms such 
skies as Europe seldom sees. One spends weeks 
abroad without the sun. For half the year the gray 
day is in fashion; while the feeling of the American 
is that it is the business of clouds to rain, and that 
when not engaged in this they should leave the sky. 
But finding that pretty much the same gloom 
obtained everywhere, we thought we profited most 
by long stays in single places. When after a few 
months the sense of repose began to wear down into 
incipient monotony, we would interpose a few weeks 
of brisk travel before settling again in some spot 


SABBATICAL YEARS 195 


widely different from the previous home. To the 
making of these successive homes we thought a few 
familiar objects useful. Usually we carried about 
with us a tablecloth, clock, hearth-rug, and many 
books. The distribution of these made even hotel 
rooms homelike. 

But hotels were little to our liking, especially those 
designed for foreigners. Finding that in pensions 
we had still less privacy, we usually took furnished 
rooms, hired a maid, and set up housekeeping. In 
Germany, for any brief period, this is impossible, 
the ubiquitous government invading the kitchen and 
prescribing the length and conditions of service. But 
in France and Italy most comfortable apartments 
can be had at rates far below those of the large hotels. 
Ours usually had three chambers, with parlor, dining 
room, and kitchen. Of the many servants who have 
been with us in all parts of Europe we never found 
one incompetent or dishonest, a record almost in- 
credible to our oppressed housekeepers. 'To several 
we became warmly attached. In America servants 
are usually helots —a subject people of alien na- 
tionality. In Europe they differ little from other 
persons except in the matter of means. We found 
several of great intelligence and dignity, but perhaps 
I ought to add that we never employed those who 
spoke English. They do not keep their quality after 
mixing much with foreigners. We generally obtained 


196 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


them through the concierge, and to them entrusted 
most of our marketing. It was always honestly done, 
at least it was done for less than I could do it. No 
doubt in order to select a good servant or concierge 
one should be a fair judge of human nature; but he 
who is not will hardly find ease in any relation of life. 

On coming to a city we ordinarily went to a small 
hotel. From this I sallied forth to explore the streets 
which struck me as best adapted for residence. Cards 
in the windows show whether there are apartments 
to let and if they are furnished. I seldom inquired the 
price, but mentioned what I was prepared to pay. 
Nor did I ever engage on a first visit; but after look- 
ing into ten or twenty houses, I made a list of the 
three or four that pleased me and reported them to 
Mrs. Palmer. ‘These we then inspected together, com- 
paring their unlike advantages, and usually were soon 
able to reach a satisfactory decision. But we did not 
feel compelled to accept what was merely pretty 
good, our faith being that in every city there were just 
the cheerful rooms we wished, and at our own price, 
if we could only find them; and never were we disap- 
pointed in our pleasant game of hide and seek. A 
little pains spent in the search saves much disap- 
pointment in the residence. Some American fears, 
too, proved groundless: difficulties did not arise in 
drawing the contract at hiring, nor on leaving were 
we charged with improper damages. That such 


SABBATICAL YEARS — 197 


‘things occur I do not doubt, but certainly they can- 
not be common. Of course out of season one has his 
best choice of rooms, gets them on his own terms, and 
keeps them only so long as he pleases. We have 
sometimes set up a home for a single month. The 
total expense of such an establishment — lodging, 
food, servant, washing, fees, and flowers, this last an 
important item — never exceeded thirty francs a day 
for the two. Often it was much less. 

Such a home once discovered is available after- 
wards. The happiness formerly enjoyed in it is pre- 
served and greets him who returns. There are fa- 
miliar faces and street-cries. The chair has a better 
place by the fire than in other rooms, and the bed 
yields sounder sleep. One is obliged to form no new 
-habits, and the means of access to the pleasant places 
-of the town are understood without inquiry. So we 
soon acquired favorite haunts. Grasmere, among the 
English Lakes, was one of them, where we lived with 
Wordsworth, the wild roses, the rattling ghylls, and 
the mists which curl about the slaty peaks. ‘To these 
gracious scenes we usually turned on landing from 
-the ocean, and would end the London shopping in 
time to spend among them the week before sailing 
home. Paris and Venice and Florence and the Uni- 
versity of my boyhood, Tiibingen in Germany, 
always claimed us. Each of these is a city of the soul 
and completely sums up a single mental attitude. 


198 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


In Paris can be had more exactly the kind of life 
one wishes, whatever that kind may be, than perhaps 
in any other city on earth. All is clean and tasteful, 
well regulated, but without the intrusions of Ger- 
many. The French, it is true, are the Chinese of 
Europe, and possess an intelligence rigidly circum- 
scribed by custom and locality. They lean helplessly 
on institutions, have small individual power, and 
little curiosity about anything which does not fall 
within their usual experience. Deep insights, result- 
ing in beauty, invention, or religion, are therefore 
denied them. But prettiness abounds, convenience, 
dignified courtesies and ceremonials. ‘The people are 
kind and attachable. Such matters are worth more 
to visitors than the profounder constituents of life. 
Indeed they impart better the desired sense of for- 
eignness, the very restrictions of the French mind, —~ 
its inability to move beyond the limits of its language, 
land or etiquette, — quickly forcing the stranger to 
feel that he is far from that country of his own which 
he would for the moment forget. 

Sometimes we were in new Paris, on the Rue 
Galilée, just off the Champs Elysées — that match- 
less avenue which more than any other city street 
thrills the beholder and invites him to loiter or to sit. 
There too the Bois was at hand and flight to the 
country easy. Sometimes we lived in the Latin Quar- 
ter — more Latin then than now — haunting Notre 


SABBATICAL YEARS 199 


Dame, the bookshops on the Quays, the lectures at 
the Sorbonne, the admirable plays and conférences 
of the Odéon, the student restaurants. Really to 
know Mrs. Palmer one should see her as a merry girl 
in a French pdétisserte or on an omnibus top. We 
usually spent the morning at home, had an early 
déjeuner and then for exercise went into the country, 
walked the Long Gallery of the Louvre, — where one 
may not sit, —looked into some church, took a seat 
in a steamboat on the river, or hunted up some spot 
connected with the Commune or the greater Revolu- 
tion. Enlarging one’s acquaintance with a foreign 
language is a happy way of wasting a large amount 
of time; and this makes it one of the fittest sabbatical 
occupations for a busy pair. Mrs. Palmer, however, 
would occasionally turn aside from paths of rectitude 
and visit schools. 

This description of our modes of life in Paris 
applies, mutatis mutandis, to Venice and Florence, 
only that Venice was the one spot in Europe which 
best met Mrs. Palmer’s ideas of Paradise. She loved 
it with romantic passion, walking its winding alleys, 
- inhabiting its churches, and sitting in its Piazza and 
Academy as if all belonged to her. The Venetians 
have fashioned their own world. Into it they have 
admitted abundantly religion, law, and sensuous 
enjoyment, and thought of these always as friendly. 

Everywhere they have demanded beauty, and taken 


200 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


the kind they preferred rather than the inherited 
types. All this was congenial to her. Loving pictures 
as she did, she prized every gallery in proportion to 
the number of its Venetian masters. In the beautiful 
city itself she cared as much for the works of nature 
as for those of man, for in it the two ever intermingle. 
Its morning and evening lights she thought lovelier 
than elsewhere, as was also the foliage which at 
intervals overhangs the watery streets, or the sky 
sharply cut by the graceful architecture. We spent 
an entire winter there, besides making shorter stays 
at every possible season, living generally in an old 
palace on the Grand Canal, a little beyond Sta. Maria 
della Salute. 

To each, however, of the years we passed abroad 
we took care to assign some novel feature. This kept 
the sameness refreshing. One Spring we spent in 
Greece, going to Ithaca, to Delphi, and Olympia. 
Greek had early been a favorite study of Mrs. 
Palmer’s, and she came to the enjoyment of that: 
unique sculpture and architecture not unprepared. 
It is impossible to knock the beauty out of a piece of 
marble which a Greek hand has touched. While a 
fragment remains, the master is there. She at least 
found no difficulty in overlooking absent heads and 
legs, and easily turned her mind to the loveliness that 
is left. Greek gravestones she learned to know in 
Athens for the first time, and was deeply moved by 


SABBATICAL YEARS 201 


their method of proclaiming no grief, but resting in 
some remembered scene from the life of him who had 
gone. She gathered all procurable photographs of 
them, as of the splendid tombs of Italy, and placed 
them together in a book which she called her Grave- 
yard. Yet she enjoyed Greece not merely because 
the Greeks had enjoyed it, but for the same reasons 
as they. Its colored soils, the noble outlines of its 
heights, its atmosphere, its ever present sea, its olive 
trees, intoxicated her and kept her from regretting 
its generally absent verdure. She interested herself 
too in its present conditions and people. Dr. Schlie- 
mann was hospitable. ‘The accomplished sister of 
Prime Minister Tricoupis became her friend. 

But our greatest novelty, and the one to which her 
thoughts afterwards most often recurred, was our 
bicycling — a sport now almost exterminated by the 
exciting and lazy automobile. One year we carried 
our wheels from America and, starting from Rouen, 
rode through Normandy, Brittany, and parts of 
Picardy and Provence; then over the Corniche Road 
from Fréjus to Alassio; we crossed the three hundred 
and sixty miles of Styria and Carinthia lying between 
Venice and Vienna; rode through the Black Forest 
from Tiibingen to Freiburg; and at the close took 
some stretches of central England. Altogether our 
cyclometers registered over fifteen hundred miles. 

When we left home she had sat on a bicycle only three 


202 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


times; but as she had the queer characteristic of 
doing excellently and at once whatever she did, on 
our first day in Normandy she rode eighteen miles 
with entire ease. 

The sport of bicycling suited Mrs. Palmer’s pas- 
sion for independence as did little else. Ready as her 
sympathies regularly were, she was no less ready, 
when the burden of the world became oppressive, to 
throw them all aside. Then she would renew herself 
in utter freedom and isolation, afterwards coming 
forth ardently social again. In her the child and the 
responsible woman were ever amusingly combined. 
It was the former that steered when she sat on her 
bicycle. At the call of the white road she felt all ties 
to be cut. The world was all before her where to 
choose. She could turn to the right or left, could feel 
the down-pressed pedal and the rushing air, could 
lie in the shade by the roadside, visit a castle, dally 
long at luncheon, gather grapes or blackberries from 
the field, stop at whatever small inn might attract 
at night, and for days together commune rather with 
nature than with man. To preserve the fullest sense 
of independence we sent forward no trunk to meet 
us at appointed spots, but designed a soft bag for 
the bicycle which would hold supplies for three weeks. 
We made our nights long, beginning to ride about 
half-past nine in the morning and ending in time for 
the bath »nd rest before dinner. We rode slowly, 


SABBATICAL YEARS 203 


avoiding records of more than forty miles a day, and 
dismounting at every colorable excuse; our rule for 
hills being that wherever a horse should walk, we 
would. Nor did we practise anything like continuous 
riding. A week or two on the bicycle was generally 
put in between two periods of housekeeping; though 
if we happened in one of our jaunts on any specially 
charming village, we lingered as long as the charm 
continued. Of course we kept clear of railroads and 
tourist regions, and so were able to meet the common 
people in their homes and fields. Among the peasants 
we learned always to make our inquiries of the 
women, who are far less lumpish than the men. They 
take the produce to market, supervise the children, 
and in general manage the intellectual side of the 
farm. In consequence they have their wits about 
them and are often capable of an immediate answer. 
To bring the man’s mind into action requires at least 
three questions. 

Such were our vacation years. From them what 
stores of health and courage were borne away! What 
vivid pictures were stored in memory, subsequently 
to be the joy, not of solitude, but of crowded and 
parted days! What happy intimacy of companion- 
ship was had when two, always close in heart, but 
ordinarily much separated by occupation, could for 
a long period honorably make each other their sole 
concern! 


204 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


LETTERS 


Tell us of Cambridge and Wellesley. We are 
hungry for every scrap of news of them, in spite of 
the bliss in which we find ourselves here. And 
really in our part of Lucerne all is like the story-book 
happenings. Our big sunny room has east and south’ 
windows, and our poetical balcony, furnished with 
tables and chairs, overhangs a charming garden, laid 
out with rare trees and shrubs along its winding 
walks, and sloping to the bright green waters of the 
lake. All day below us gay little boats and busy 
steamers hurry by, or float as lazily as the hundreds: 
of swans and ducks among them. And always the 
mountains guard us. Before us is the Titlis glacier; 
to the right and left Pilatus and the Rhighi. Here 
we sojourn for a happy fortnight. 

We have been on the Continent nearly a month; 
and our few days in England were delightful, in spite 
of the rain. The fragrance of our drives and walks 
in the English Lake country, our talks and readings 
there, will follow me to gray hairs. London itself 
was then as now suffering a deluge. We sought refuge 
in the British Museum and National Gallery. In 
such arks one could pass a forty days’ flood com- 
fortably, but we deserted them as soon as our water- 
tight boots were made, and floated over to Rotter- 
dam. You know how we two are always lighting on 


SABBATICAL YEARS 205 


good fortune. On that passage we had the only 
stateroom of the boat. This gave us an easy night, 
with unspeakable miseries all around. Do you grow 
callous every day in Europe to the woes of humanity ? 
Or do you stay awake nights with your unhappy 
fellow-mortals, as helpless as they ? 

Our chief resting place between London and here 
was Tiibingen, where G. once spent two years at the 
University. I wanted to know the quaint town. So 
we settled for ten days at the Golden Lamb, with our 
windows looking out on the Markt Platz, where 
peasant women sat all day beside their fruit and 
vegetable baskets. Each night the storks came home 
from the fields, and with their long legs perching on 
the housetops looked solemnly down on their neigh- 
bors’ red peaked roofs, in proper fairy story fashion. 
There I had my first experience of German dinner 
parties; for the professors were most hospitable and 
gave us extraordinary entertainments. Such mysteri- 
ous pyramids of unknown contents, into which I un- 
blushingly plunged as the guest of honor, trembling 
inwardly, and without a notion of how they should be 
attacked. Ought one to make the onset on the east or 
west tower, or strike directly at the base? Then the 
wild efforts to discuss American and German affairs 
with their English and my South German! Well, thal. 
week in the Fatherland was memorable; and in spite 
of the novelty of formal toasts at the dinners, they 


206 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


were good dinners and the people endlessly kind and 
thoughtful. In Suabia even the conductors and old 
women treated me as if I were a long lost grandchild. 


This fragrant green sunny valley is so fair to look 
upon! The peasant girls are raking the thick hay on 
steep slopes; old women are drying their clothes in 
the spicy air; cattle and goats are climbing among 
the rocks for the juicy grass, and the sound of their 
many bells and the cries of the herdsmen and shep- 
herds come like music from afar; and always night 
and day the Fiescher-Bach rushes and tumbles by 
our windows on its way from the glacier just around 
the shoulder of the mountain to join the river below. 
It seems as if the brooks and bells were in another 
world and we heard them in dreams only. 


We have mounted up to this height through suc- 
cessive steps. First came the valleys, with cottages 
and fields; then rich green slopes; a little higher, 
forests of pine and fir; above these, the red-brown 
heather with broken granite rocks, sometimes scat- 
tered here and there, sometimes piled in high masses; 
and still above, desolations which look as if a world 
had been shattered in pieces and heaped against the 
sky. Making our way among millions of boulders of 
granite, slate, and marble, we find patches of snow, 
and finally we reach the snow fields themselves and 


SABBATICAL YEARS 207 


look out upon the most extensive system of glaciers 
which Europe can show,— four in sight at once, — 
the largest fifteen miles long. It looks like a wide 
frozen river, the surface seamed and scarred, winding 
its way fearfully among the craggy peaks. 


On reaching Paris we went to the little native hotel 
which L. mentioned and found it as pleasant as he 
promised, except that we could get no sunshine there. 
So G. set forth to find “the sunniest pleasantest rooms 
in Paris at a merely nominal rent.”” I laughed when 
he came home the first night, his pedometer showing 
that he had walked twelve miles. The second day 
he walked fourteen. But he had found an apartment 
which we took for two months the instant I saw it. 
I should be relieved if I could have rooms so beauti- 
ful in Cambridge. They cover an entire fourth floor 
— third, they call it here. You should see our pretty 
parlor. It, and every room as well, has an open fire- 
place. We burn soft coal and wood, and always have 
the cheer of a blaze on our hearth. The carpet is 
dark red and brown. At the three long windows are 
white lace curtains with red hangings. We have two 
red sofas, three arm-chairs, and five others all covered 
with the same plush. The centre table has our cover 
on it, with a bowl of dahlias in the middle. At the 
side of the room is a rosewood writing desk, with con- 
venient drawers; and near the fire-place a little booke 


208 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


case with our books, a blossoming plant on its top. 
Three good pictures are on the walls, which are 
themselves decorated tastefully with panels, carvings, 
and mirrors. The dining room and three chambers 
are no less charming. 

Our servant can neither speak nor understand a 
word of anything except French, but she is a creature 
of so many perfections that I hesitate to catalogue 
them. With Marie Louise in charge, French house- 
keeping is play. We are growing fat under her pro- 
viding care. She does our marketing and restricts 
all extravagance. But she puts such an exquisite 
flavor into her dishes as makes us grieve over her small 
outlay. We have protested against two as a limit to 
pieces of bread, chops, etc. I think she eats nothing 
herself. We have been compelled to forbid her 
cleaning the whole apartment every day, for we were 
sometimes kept up at night by her labors with the 
dust-cloth. She feels the deprivation, and when we 
announce that we are going out to Marly or Fon- 
tainebleau, she indulges in a genuine spring cleaning 
After doing everything else, she searches my clothes 
to find a possible stitch to take, and takes it most 
daintily. If you could see this middle-aged, never- 
smiling, spotless woman and the manifold ways she 
contrives for guarding us, you would be amused and 
touched. She seems to love us, at least to regard us 
as a pair of babes to be cared for. 


SABBATICAL YEARS 209 


We give some hours to study in the morning, then 
in the middle of the day go out, and are generally at 
home again an hour before dinner. In the evening 
we read aloud. You can imagine our delightful days 
in the Louvre, on the broad walks of St. Cloud, 
or under the trees and along the terrace of St. Ger- 
main. Whether on the Boulevards, or on the river, 
in the churches, shops, theatres, or restaurants, we 
are always in the midst of these throngs of merry 
pleasure-loving French people. ‘They impress me as 
grown-up children who want pretty things and “‘a 
good time,” but are far more thoughtless than inten- 
tionally wicked — as the Puritan regards them. And 
to be amused is not the only interest of the Paris of 
to-day. These people are wildly democratic. *‘ Equal- 
ity’ is a passion with them. The kitchen maid 
respectfully addresses the young fellow who brings 
up the coal as ‘‘Monsieur.’” Everywhere and in 
every relation of life this love of equality occurs. 
The old fruit-woman at the corner expects and re- 
ceives the same civility that belongs to “Madame.” 
The rich and the poor are found together in their 
pleasures, and taking far more pleasure than with us, 
I am sure. Good nature and politeness are every- 
where; yet when they give way, a Frenchman is 
capable of more brutality, I think, than any other 
human being. 

- But no one can realize who does not live here how 


210 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


every man, woman, and child hates Germany. 
When we asked for Jaeger flannels the other day, 
the clerk declared that the French did not need 
German clothes. You insult a person by inquiring, 
even in the mildest way, if he speaks German. The 
History which the minister of education approves 
for French schools closes with an appeal to the boys 
to be soldiers and prepare to fight Germany, and 
to the girls to maintain the same “patriotism.” In 
our peaceful parlor we hear the nightly cheers for 
Boulanger, who lives only a few doors away. Nobody 
can tell why he is so popular, except that he is 
“brave” and does n’t like things as they are. The 
French must have somebody to adore, like a senti- 
mental schoolgirl. Indeed how these Europeans, in 
the mass, like to be managed and governed! 


Last week the weather was so fine we took three 
days in Picardy. We rode seventy-five miles on our 
bicycles, one hundred and eighty on the railroad. 
For cathedrals we saw Beaumont, Senlis, Noyon, 
Soissons, Laon ; and for castles, Chantilly, Compiégne, 
Coucy, and Pierrefonds. Oh, such delicious country, 
full of happy harvesters! It is pure joy to ride through 
the rich fields. How pleasant to be so independent 
of trains, to be able to take thirty miles a day of 
glorious motion, seeing these beautiful scenes where 
world-influencing dramas have been played! We often 


SABBATICAL YEARS 211 


long to make a present of the day we are enjoying 
to some one across the sea. 

The chief crop of these central plains at present 
is sugar beets. They are enormous, and the farmers 
draw them on gigantic wagons with six white oxen 
to the factories. Men, women, and children are 
everywhere in the fields together, digging the beets, 
burning the tops, and making holiday. When we 
were riding before, the most striking thing was the 
ripe buckwheat. Now the beets take their turn, and 
of course great quantities of apples, potatoes, and 
carrots. I wish you could see the big oxen and the 
stout Normandy and Percheron horses. We stopped 
at the castle where the villain lived whose wickedness 
gave rise to the story of Blue-Beard. You will be 
relieved to know that at last he was hung for his 
_cruelties. 


Our Boston paper says that Catharine S. has mar- 
ried Mr. T. And who is Mr. T., and is it true? If 
it is true, I am glad for her with all my heart. Her 
health will be better and her writing less nervous, 
if once she is taken care of as you and I are so hap- 
pily. Yes, my dear, I will confess that your husband 
is the best man in the world, except one. But I don’t 
know what will happen if life goes on growing so 
much better and brighter each year. How does your 
cup manage to hold so much? Mine is running over, 


212 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


and I keep getting larger cups; but I can’t contain 
all my blessings and gladness. We are both so well 
and busy that the days are never half long enough. 


Thursday afternoon we left Avignon, where we 
had a week of great enjoyment. John Stuart Mill 
and his wife are buried there, and her daughter — 
now a woman of sixty — still lives in their house. I 
went to see her. A friend of hers, too, took me to 
meet some of the Provencal poets, so I drank tea 
in a palace built before 1400, where to-day an 
American lady lives whose daughter has married a 
marquis. We had much talk of America. The little 
daughter of the marquis sat in my lap and said she 
would go home with me “where the children play in 
English.” I visited three girls’ schools in Avignon, 
and for the first time in my life got into a convent 
school. The one for poor children was delightful; 
over three hundred little things under seven years 
of age, the sisters devoting themselves to them with- 
out pay. But the other, for the daughters of the 
aristocracy, was very fashionable, the teaching poor, 
and no discipline. 


After Avignon and a day spent in Marseilles, we 
went by train as far as Fréjus. Since then we have 
been riding our bicycles along the Corniche Road, 
nearly two hundred miles. Every inch of it has been 


SABBATICAL YEARS 213 


bliss, even the walk of twelve miles one day, pushing 
our bicycles up hill. One night we ran into this queer 
little Italian town of Alassio, nestling between the 
mountains and the sea, and found ourselves on a 
noble bay, sheltered on every side, and in a hotel 
which was a convent until five years ago. Our room 
is the chapel, still keeping its sacred decorations 
and its two long windows overlooking the unbroken 
sea, which rolls within twenty feet of our sunny bal- 
cony. All is so bewitching that instead of going the 
next morning, as we intended, we have remained 
five days, though we have only the clothes we carry 
on our bicycles. We lie in the sand, we gather the 
blossoming flowers, the ripe oranges and olives, and 
are sure that it is June and not January. Anything 
like this I have never experienced before, and I 
find it unspeakably fascinating. Indeed the whole 
Corniche Road is enchanting, with its perpetual 
roses, its palms loaded with ripening dates, and the 
blue sea under a cloudless sky. You two must cer- 
tainly do it sometime. Married lovers could n’t find 
a prettier holiday. 


Here we are in Venice looking out on the Adriatic 
Sea, where the sun is setting like a great ball of fire 
that almost blinds my eyes when I lift them. All the 
morning that sun has been streaming into our two 
pretty rooms. We are having delicious weather, clear 


214 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


and soft, like a fresh Spring day at home. We sit in 
the sunshine, or wander up and down the narrow 
passage-ways, or float in fascinating gondolas, to 
our hearts’ content. Just under our windows, so close 
that we see nothing between, lie rows upon rows of 
vessels. Forests of masts fly all flags that Webster’s 
Dictionary knows and many others one imagines. 
Beyond these lie ocean steamers, and then the great 
and wide sea. I never felt so much abroad before. 
This melancholy mermaid city seems nothing short 
of a miracle; for as the eye rests on the salt green 
water stretching in every direction, it is impossible 
to feel that it is really shallow. Lately a road has 
been carried over half a mile of water to the main- 
land. As we stepped from the train it was perplexing 
to find myself in a great city, yet with no sound of 
horse, carriage, or any of the multitude of street 
noises which we usually associate with city life. The 
cabs are black gondolas, half way between a canoe 
and a Wellesley boat, and on them stands the pic- 
turesque Italian with his one oar, steering swiftly 
around sharp corners and under low bridges which 
cross the narrow spaces between high buildings on 
either side. It is altogether unreal. At present we are 
devoting much time to Italian. Last week we read 
together an Italian book of two hundred and fifty 
pages; and in odds and ends of time I have read 
in English Ruskin’s “Stones of Venice,” Howells’ 


SABBATICAL YEARS 215 


9 


“Venetian Life,” Sismondi’s “Italy,” and am half 
through one of Symonds’ books on the Renaissance. 
It is good to read the great books about Italy while 
among the scenes they discuss. How hard it will be 
some day to break away from the palace where we 
live and from the daily sight of the most beautiful 
church and the most beautiful pictures that the world 
contains! We know we ought to go south. But a 
spell is on us. ‘There is always another picture to see 
of Titian or Veronese or Tintoret or Bellini or 
Carpaccio, and we linger. 


Mother, dear, if my memory serves me, something 
important in the history of our family happened on 
this day thirty-five years ago. I think I cannot be 
mistaken in fixing so fundamental a date, though you 
may have been too youthful to retain a distinct recol- 
lection of the event. But I who profited by that mar- 
riage more than any one else, by at least twenty-one 
months, am heartily grateful to you for doing it, and 
send my congratulations on the day. 

We are keeping the festival in royal fashion, spend- 
ing the perfect Spring day in the country at Hadrian’s 
Villa and Tivoli. All the superb morning we have 
been driving among the hills and valleys and olive- 
slopes and vineyards, seeing snowy mountains, rivers, 
city, and plain, with now and then a Robbia in a 
gountry church or an old convent fresco. The Sabine 


216 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Mountains are on one side of us, the Alban Hills on 
the other, and our road of twenty miles runs through 
fresh green fields. Mr. and Mrs. P. have been with 
us — hea writer, she an artist — and Mr. E. too, who 
is an intimate friend of Cardinal Hohenlohe. This 
Cardinal owns the beautiful Villa d’ Este, and our 
sculptor took us through its stately rooms and its 
fascinating gardens. There we heard the nightin- 
gales, singing among cypresses that are many centu- 
ries old. ‘The whole day has been a dream of delight, 
one of the most interesting since we came abroad — 


high praise indeed! 


We have been in Rome several weeks and have 
given up practically all our time to sightseeing, some- 
thing which we never intend to do. G. declares that 
he is ashamed of having seen so many things. We 
always try to keep half our day for study and home, 
and I am sure that in this way we gain more than the 
sightseers. But somehow in Rome every one catches 
the fever, and the number of wretched old ruins and 
scandalously tawdry and dirty churches that one can 
manage to gaze at and pry about is amazing; and all 
this fuss because here some old Roman set up a 
column to commemorate his brutal battles, or there 
some saint is imagined to have caused a spring of oil 
to burst from the stones, or to have walked about 
with his head in his hands among the soldiers who 


SABBATICAL YEARS 217 


cut it off. But we have seen so many bones of saints 
and martyrs that we are now too hardhearted any 
longer to glance their way. 


While our bicycles are being passed from one 
country to the other, I sit on a stone by the roadside 
and write to you. The whole population of the village 
is assembled to see what a lady with a bicycle can 
mean; and all the people are tipping my saddle and 
wondering over the cyclometer, astonished that such 
a little thing can measure distance. It really tells us 
that we have ridden more than a thousand miles 
already in France and Italy. We are now on our way 
from Venice to Vienna. We ride about thirty-five 
miles a day. Tuesday we were on the wide plain of 
Northern Italy and visited Asolo, the poet Brown- 
ing’s last country home. We saw his house and gar- 
den. In the Italian towns we came upon many 
splendid pictures. Yesterday we reached the moun- 
tain chain which divides Italy from Austria, and ever 
since have been climbing up or running down hills, 
following the beds of narrow streams which cut their 
way down snow-peaked mountains. The streams 
are very full, and the sound of mountain torrents is 
always with us. It is a strange, wild country, strange 
people too, so excited at seeing me on a bicycle that 
the town hurries to watch us pass. As we fly by, the 
women drop their baskets, cross themselves, and litt 


218 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


their hands, crying, “O Madonna mia!” G. says 
it is the greeting of “the new woman” by the old, and 
“the new” does n’t even stop to listen. 

But I must tell you how we are crossing the 
frontier. A little river separates the two countries, 
with Pontrebba on the Italian, and Pontafel on the 
Austrian side. Both ends of the bridge are guarded 
by three tremendous officials, each in the uniform 
of his native land, the two sets within easy talking 
distance. We rode up to the three Italians, dis- 
mounted, and presented our paper asking for the 
eighty-five francs exacted on our bicycles when we 
entered Italy, and destined to be returned when we 
depart. You would suppose no event of similar con- 
sequence had occurred in a century. It is impossible 
to report the consultations, the expeditions to other 
parts of the town, the hunting up of dignitaries that 
followed. An Austrian was finally summoned from 
his end of the bridge, the chief Italian swung a gun 
over his shoulder, and we were led across half a mile 
to the Austrian Custom House, where our bicycles 
were deposited, probably to make sure they would 
be out of Italy when we received our money. We 
ourselves returned in procession to Italy, our hands 
full of documents, and even then had to go to two 
other places before the money was paid. We reached 
the bridge at 9.30, and are just leaving it at 12.15. 
Our Italian chief would not attend to anything for 


SABBATICAL YEARS 219 


half an hour, “because the train would pass then,” 
so we were obliged to sit and meditate until that 
event occurred. Fancy these people in Chicago! 
Nirvana is the only place where they will feel really 
at home. But nothing can stop the delight of the day. 
It is very early Spring. The cuckoos are calling, the 
cherry trees are in blossom, and the grass is at its 
greenest. Here we leave dear Italy and must begin 
at once to limber up our German tongues. One of 
those words makes such a big mouthful that I choke 
and sneeze in spite of myself. 


XT 


CAMBRIDGE 


On leaving Wellesley Mrs. Palmer had her first 
opportunity to become a lady of leisure. Up to this 
time she had been steadily under compulsion. The 
desire for education, the need of earning her own 
support, the demands of schools or the college with 
which she was connected, laid their necessitating 
hands upon her successive years and allowed her 
little freedom of choice. Now such severities were 
ended. She was to live in comfort, surrounded by 
all the opportunities for study, society, and travel 
which were especially congenial to her. Official ties 
were snapped. She had performed a difficult public 
work, climbing through it from obscurity to note, 
and she was still but thirty-two. For most of us at 
that age the tasks of life lie directly ahead; for Mrs. 
Palmer they were already behind. 

And a lady of leisure of a peculiar sort Mrs. Palmer 
actually became. Henceforth she did what she 
pleased. I have called this last period of her career 
her time of Self-Expression, because all that was 
done in it sprang from the glad prompting of disci- 
plined powers rather than from any pressure of out- 


AODGINANVO SLAAUMLS AONIND IT 








CAMBRIDGE . 22) 


ward obligation. Her times were in her hand; her 
own interests she was free to follow. This portion of 
my book will show how she followed them. Pro- 
foundly dear as they were, of course she followed 
them with energy, and even allowed them to make 
the fourth period of her life as active as the third. 
But it was a voluntary and exultant activity. Who- 
ever saw her during these years remarked in her new 
buoyancy and a wider power. The shelter of a home 
had enlarged her scope. From special labor in a par- 
ticular spot she advanced to general influence in the 
whole field of girls’ education. The occupations of 
her thirteen winters in Cambridge I relate here, but: 
I give them in a classified summary rather than in 
detailed chronological sequence. 

Underneath them all ran a rich domestic life, 
though several years passed after Mrs. Palmer’s 
marriage before she acquired a permanent and ade- 
quate home. ‘That is something hard to find in Cam: 
bridge. The University occupies the centre of the 
town. Around it gather shops, churches, factories, 
stables, lodging houses; but the number of private 
dwellings is small. Whoever possesses one in the 
college neighborhood does not readily part with it. 
Those who connect themselves with the University 
for the first time have ordinarily an uncomfortable 
preliminary season, during which they sit at a dis« 
tance, like fishhawks on a tree, spying after some 


222 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


thing to seize. On the whole, we passed this awkward 
period more easily than most of our colleagues. 
Between the wedding and the departure for Europe 
there were but six months. During these, and for a 
year after our return, we took houses already fur- 
nished on Broadway and Brattle Streets. Then for 
three years we occupied the Deanery of the Episcopal 
Theological School, until in 1894 we established our- 
selves in the historic house at the corner of the College 
Yard and Quincy Street. This house, built about 
1815, was bought by the College twenty years later, 
was equipped as an observatory, and made the resi- 
dence of its first Professor of Astronomy. Later it was 
occupied successively by President Felton, Bishop 
Huntington, and for thirty-three years by the saintly 
Dr. Andrew Preston Peabody. We readjusted its 
interior to our needs, constructing a large library 
and arranging Mrs. Palmer’s study and waiting 
rooms so that in receiving one caller she need not be 
disturbed by the coming of another. To this house 
she became strongly attached. In it her complex 
work was done with the utmost convenience; here 
she easily assembled several hundred guests; its 
plain old-fashioned comfort made shy students feel 
at home; and it was but fifteen minutes distant from 
those parts of Boston to which business called her 
oftenest. An old house harbors peace better than a 
new one. At 11 Quincy Street Mrs. Palmer found 


CAMBRIDGE 223 


that peace, found too the dignified surroundings to 
which her idealizing affections most naturally clung. 
Nearly half her life had been passed within college 
walls, until the august connection had become al- 
most a part of her being. Here, among the buildings, 
trees, and grounds of our stateliest university that 
tie continued, but in a form which freed it from 
all burdensome responsibility. 

When she left Wellesley I wondered how the busi- 
ness of housekeeping would suit her. Few young 
married women have had so little experience of it. 
For fifteen years, almost uninterruptedly since she 
left her early home, she had been an inmate of some 
sort of institution, where attention to the daily bread 
had been the charge of some other person than her- 
self. Her rooms were generally already prepared, 
and the care of them, with the heating and lighting, 
was delegated to an official. Her special occupations 
were as remote as possible from such affairs. Indeed 
in these matters I was more experienced than she, 
having managed my own home for the nine preceding 
years and become somewhat proficient in the simpler 
forms of cookery. Whether rivalry with my accom- 
plishments stimulated her, or whether success here 
was simply another instance of that versatility which 
usually enabled her to do with instantaneous excel- 
lence whatever she was called to do, I cannot Say; 
sut certainly almost from the beginning she showed 


224 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 
herself the skilful mistress of her household. She 


was about as often consulted by bewildered house- 
keepers on puddings, carpets, and servants, as by 
teachers in regard to situations and text-books. In 
all things an artist, she prided herself on the beauty 
and orderliness of her home and was constantly 
studying how more intelligence might be brought 
into domestic methods. A few details in regard to 
the daily conduct of that home will picture her 
housewifery. 

From the first she was our financial manager. 
Whatever money was received by either of us was put 
into her safe-keeping ; and it was she who then appro- 
priately distributed it to tradesmen, pockets, and 
banks. The skilful planning of how to extract the 
largest enjoyment from a given outlay was a game 
she delighted to play, and I think her favorite volume 
was her classified account book. Her table, while 
offering few articles at a meal, must have these 
exquisitely cooked and widely varied from day to 
day. Her rooms must each have their distinctive 
note; in those used chiefly by herself were gathered 
mementoes of her childhood and the faces of those 
with whom she had since been associated. Seldom 
did she order a hat or dress outright; she would 
choose good stuffs, but must give them her own 
individual touch. Her wardrobe, therefore, most 
expressive of herself, east her incredibly little; she 


CAMBRIDGE Q25 


ever setting taste above expenditure, and often quot- 
ing in this connection the lines of an old poet, — 


Say not then this with that lace will do well, 
But this with my discretion will be brave. 


In servants she was insistent on personal quality, pre- 
ferring the capable green girl to the one who already 
“knew it all.’ Such a one she would quickly attach, 
carefully train, and then trust with large responsi- 
bility. Each servant must have a room of her own, 
be treated as a member of the household, and be 
allowed to go and come at her own discretion, pro- 
vided always that her work was exactly performed. 
Mutual consideration was soon established; and 
though Mrs. Palmer paid no excessive wages, she 
was a stranger to “the servant problem.” One ser- 
vant was with her for ten years and others for 
periods approximately long. 

In all this domestic side of life she took great 
pleasure, becoming a joyous expert not merely in 
that cheap thing “domestic science,’ but in the 
subtler matters of domestic art. Powers trained 
elsewhere were quickly adjusted to the home and 
used for the comfort of those she loved. When at 
one time she was struggling with a new cook on the 
subject of bad bread, and after encountering the usual 
excuses of oven, flour, and yeast, had invaded the 
kitchen end herself produced an excellent loaf, 


226 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


astonished Bridget summed up the situation in an 
epigram which deserves to be recorded: “'That’s 
what education means—to be able to do what 
you ve never done before.” 

Naturally, having created so beautiful a home, 
she used it liberally for entertainment, though no 
sharp distinction was ever drawn between entertain- 
ment and business. Three children of friends were 
with us for more than a year each, and almost every 
meal had also its interesting guest. With most of the 
colleges of the country she had some connection; 
and no week in the year passes without a wanderer 
from one of them appearing in Cambridge. Gener- 
ally he appeared at her table, with no great pressure 
was induced to spend the night, and then what 
detailed and eager talk was heard about the policies 
and prospects of his college! What feasible proposals 
she would offer for its strengthening! How fitted to 
their surroundings were the candidates she named 
for its instructors! Her hospitable mind admitted 
no notion of colleges as rivals; all were alike members 
of the one army of education. At other meals ap- 
peared the young women whose opening fortunes 
required an assisting hand. ‘There came, too, direc: 
tors of her many societies and the members of in- 
numerable committees. Poor people came, whose 
only reason for coming was hopelessness. And here 
also gathered her host of personal friends, eager 


CAMBRIDGE 227 


always to gaze, to listen, and to be quickened. Often 
of an evening, and always on Tuesday and Sunday 
afternoons, there were Harvard students, some bring- 
ing notes of introduction, some already counting them- 
selves her children, and easily getting their slender 
claims acknowledged. With them all she talked 
much, gaily or gravely, as occasion required. By 
turns she was suggestive, inspiring, consolatory, or 
simply amusing; ever light of touch, ready of anec- 
dote, charming all and setting all at ease, while the 
plainest fact was not allowed to pass without some 
shining word, or the merriest jest without its hold on 
reality. This perpetual mingling of sobriety and 
play was hers from childhood. I was often reminded 
of Shenstone’s heroine : — 

With her mien she enamors the brave; 

- With her wit she engages the free; 


With her modesty pleases the grave; 
She is every way pleasing to me. 


Of her relations with my own work I may say that 
while she assisted me in making acquaintance with 
my students and had much influence over student 
life in general, for philosophy itself she had no 
natural inclination, its speculative side being pecu- 
liarly foreign to her. She was a woman of action, 
ideals, and practical adjustments. But none the less 
she honored what she did not herself pursue, and 
felt strongly the vital issues of the ethical doctrines 


228 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


which it was mine to elaborate. With full under- 
standing and sympathy she discussed the less techni- 
cal parts of my studies and offered her mind as a 
field for experimentation. Whatever I wrote was 
submitted to her exacting taste. But in all our 
intellectual companionship there was no merging; 
each had his and her special interests, to which the 
other came merely as a novice. I was as ignorant 
of her school problems and of what was being done 
for the training of girls as she of my dialectics. Her 
style of speech and writing remained her own, widely 
unlike mine. We prized the strength of difference 
rather than that of identity, though pleased at any 
parts within us which happened to be interchange- 
able. Usually she took charge of the kitchen, and I 
of the college; but when she was called for a time 
to Chicago or elsewhere to manage a college, she left 
the kitchen to me. If one of us had promised a public 
address and was suddenly disabled, the other ap- 
peared. Contrasted and supplemental occupations, 
profound sympathy, and occasional substitutions 
formed our happy bond. St. Paul says that “love 
envieth not,’ but is glad when the loved one pos- 
sesses what he lacks. 

In describing the activities of her winter months 
I linger long over the home and its habits, because 
in her judgment — and in that also, I believe, of 
those who knew her best — the roots of her power 


CAMBRIDGE 229 


were there. People sometimes spoke of her as a 
“public character,” not noticing how the phrase — 
though true — blots what was most distinctive of her. 
Her publicity was but an expression of her private 
womanhood. She was the same person everywhere. 
Led by broad popular sympathies to improve the 
conditions of her sex, she preserved in a public field 
the simplicity, ease, dignity, and refinement which 
graced her fireside. She did not turn to occupations 
outside the home because those within it were dis- 
tasteful; but powers already exceptional when she 
entered that home became there so refreshed, 
gladdened, and enlarged that they overflowed the 
usual bounds and ran forth in multitudinous 
blessing. I have said in discussing our marriage 
that something of this sort was from the first our 
hope. And so it proved. The work begun at 
Wellesley was not broken during the fifteen years in 
Cambridge, but was vastly assisted by the surround- 
ings of a home. What was that work? Was it as 
fragmentary as it sometimes seemed, or had it inner 
unity and a ground in public needs? Before marking 
out its several sections, it will be well to fix attention 
for a moment on its genuine unity. 

The times were critical when Mrs. Palmer ap- 
peared. Social transformations were in progress. 
Girls were just emerging from sheltered homes, 
desirous of education and of whatever else might 


230 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


help to enlarge their lives. Many feared that such 
desires might dispose them to drop the quietness, 
delicacy, and spiritual power which were hereditarily 
theirs and to admit into their natures the ruder forces 
of our turbulent world. Most social changes involve 
danger. Mrs. Palmer did much to lessen this danger 
and to quiet these fears. She not only opened college 
doors, but she helped to fix a standard of what college 
girls should be. Persuasively and in her own person 
she showed how a deepened intelligence and a wider 
knowledge of affairs may heighten the characteris- 
tic and ancestral traits of woman and permanently, 
increase her charm. Each of Mrs. Palmer’s under- 
takings in this her culminating period represents a 
single aspect of the one aim, to guide the emancipa- 
tion and integrity of women, particularly as these are 
affected by education. A priestly and impalpable task 
it was, to become the watcher of a social transition; 
but it was an immensely important task, and one for 
which she was singularly fitted. ‘The several forms 
which this aim assumed I now describe. 

In the first place she kept her allegiance to Welles- 
ley, and to it gave a large amount of time. That col- 
lege is governed by a large Board of Trustees, but 
its immediate direction is in the hands of the Presi- 
dent and a small Executive Committee. On this 
committee Mrs. Palmer accepted a place, and was 
seldom absent from its meetings. She had her dis- 


CAMBRIDGE 231 


tinct lines of policy there, but in working with others 
it was her habit rather to inspire than to dictate. She 
would open up a subject, state the facts, explain the 
principles involved, draw attention to the essential 
features of the case, and wait for others to offer their 
opinions. By conviction she was patient of debate, 
believing that no matter is ever really settled till all 
its points are discussed. When a decision was to be 
reached, she liked better to have it brought about by 
the judgment of others than through her advocacy. 
In deliberations with her one got the impression of 
a person who has no way of her own, but who merely 
joins with others in a common search for the best 
way. 

Such a spirit of moderation, tact, and respect for 
dissenting opinions was peculiarly needed on the 
Wellesley committee during her membership; for 
the college was then passing through grave transi- 
tions. ‘Three presidents came successively into 
office, all strong and independent women, much 
unlike herself, all chosen with her approval and ever 
her constant friends. Then certain arrangements of 
the college made by its founders underwent con- 
siderable change. Mr. and Mrs. Durant had estab- 
lished and highly valued a low tuition fee, a system 
of daily domestic work, “Silent Times,” and fre- 
quent attendance on religious exercises. As the 
college grew, these provisions conflicted with more 


32 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


important interests and were one after the other 
removed. But much time and mutual forbearance 
were needed for changes so fundamental. Mrs. 
Palmer favored them all, working toward them in 
company with Mrs. Durant — the sturdy defender 
of her husband’s plans so long as defence was likely 
to effect anything; but whe, when the new order was 
established, showed herself as loyal to it as to the 
old. During this period, too, it became necessary 
to find a new treasurer, to adopt a new system of 
financial control and report, and in general to trans- 
fer the college from private to public guardianship. 
All this the Trustees would have found impossible 
without the codperation and magnanimity of Mrs. 
Durant; but -under the best of circumstances it 
brought on them, and especially on the executive 
committee, a burdensome amount of care. OF this 
care Mrs. Palmer took her full share, as she did also 
of the selection of teachers, the assistance of poor 
students, and the raising of funds both for them and 
for the many needs of the expanding college. What- 
ever helps a girls’ college she believed helps men and 
women everywhere. 

She was consequently ready to aid other colleges 
beside Wellesley. In 1892 the University of Chicago 
was founded and called us to two of its chairs; she 
to be Professor of History and Dean of Women, I to 
be the head of the department of Philosophy. It was 


CAMBRIDGE 233 


an attractive offer. Here once more pioneer work 
gave opportunity for that creative power in which 
she had already proved herself strong. Most of those 
engaged in organizing the novel university she knew 
well, and many of its Faculty were her personal 
friends. She admired the wisdom of its chief founder, 
who accepted no place on its Board of Trustees, 
selected or rejected none of its teachers, gave no 
money to its buildings, but provided liberal means 
for carrying on a university so far as others might 
come forward to construct it. Of course she approved 
the provision of its constitution which opens to 
women as well as men all its opportunities of study 
and teaching; for in her judgment, and in mine too, 
coeducation is the goal at which all colleges must 
ultimately arrive. Yet in spite of these attractions, 
and the fact that the salaries offered were three times 
what we then received in Cambridge, her voice was 
from the first against accepting the calls. She loved 
her home. She cared little for money, having mod- 
est tastes and much enjoyment, as I have already 
shown, in getting large results from small outlays. 
My roots, she thought, were too deep in Harvard 
soil for removal to be quite honorable. She doubted 
whether our scholarly opportunities in Chicago 
would equal those in Cambridge, did not like to 
interpose such a distance between herself and Wel- 
lesley, and perhaps dreaded the wear and tear te 


234 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


which she would be exposed by another absorp- 
tion in college duties. We accordingly declined the 
call. 

But President Harper was insistent. Founding for 
the first time a great coeducational university in a 
city, he desired Mrs. Palmer’s planning and superin- 
tendence, even if she were not to be continuously on 
the ground. He proposed, therefore, that she should 
accept the Deanship of Women, without teaching, 
and with no obligation to reside in Chicago more 
than twelve weeks. The periods of her residence 
might be distributed throughout the year according 
to her convenience. In fact they often fell in times 
of my recesses, when we could be in Chicago 
together. She was to have general superintendence 
of the women’s lodging, food, conduct, and choice of 
studies, and to select a sub-Dean to carry on the 
work in her absence. ‘This proposal she accepted for 
the year 1892-93, and then, finding that measures 
well begun grow strong only by watching, she some- 
what unwillingly allowed herself to continue two 
years more. By that time the position of the women 
students was assured. ‘They were certain to hold a 
place in the university no less creditable than that of 
the men. There was no need of her difficult service. 
In June, 1895, she resigned, had a successor ap- 
pointed, and sailed away to Europe. But her interest 
in the university never ceased, nor did its gratitude 


CAMBRIDGE 235 


to her. A group of its friends have recently set a 
chime of bells in its tower, forever to voice her praise. 

Wellesley and Chicago, however, were not the only 
colleges of her care. Divergent Radcliffe was coming 
into existence beside her door. For a dozen years, 
through a Society for the Collegiate Instruction of 
Women, girls had been obtaining more or less teach- 
ing from Harvard professors. In 1894 the Massa- 
chusetts Legislature was asked to transform this 
Society into Radcliffe College, to grant its students 
degrees, and formally to attach it to Harvard Univer- 
sity. In this movement Mrs. Palmer took an active 
interest. It is true she thought the coeducational and 
the separate colleges for women have advantages 
superior to anything the segregated type can offer. 
Possibly those who devised the plan of segregation 
were more concerned with guarding men’s colleges 
from change than with enlarging woman’s opportu- 
nities. Evidently too this subordinated arrangement 
obliges women to seat themselves, as it were, at a sec- 
ond table, where the intellectual food is merely such 
surplus as is not needed elsewhere. Mrs. Palmer, at 
least, did not conceal from herself that such a col- 
Jege must always live on favors, not on rights, that 
the greater part of its instruction is likely to fall into 
young and inexperienced hands, and that when its 
teachers are pressed for time they will withdraw from 
its service and attend to the superior claims of the 


236 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


men. But these inherent weaknesses did not dis- 
courage her hopeful spirit. She was confident that 
whatever errors the plan contained would in time be 
disclosed and amended. She trusted Harvard schol- 
arship, she wished to extend its influence, and she 
thought that even a second table in Cambridge must 
prove invigorating to hungry girls. She saw too how 
in a transitional season like ours, when parents are 
slowly discovering that knowledge harms girls as 
little as boys, it is well to have that knowledge 
offered in as wide a variety of forms as possible. 
The very differences therefore between Radcliffe and 
the other colleges commended the experiment to her 
support. 

In connecting the new college with Harvard the 
question arose whether degrees should be given by 
Harvard itself or by Radcliffe. Persons whose chief 
interest was the education of women favored the 
former; those who were primarily solicitous for Har- 
vard, the latter scheme. It soon became plain that 
Harvard must decline to give the degrees unless 
Radcliffe possessed at the start an endowment of 
not less than $100,000. Whether they would be 
given even then could not be determined until the 
Spring meeting of the Harvard Corporation. In the 
mean time the Woman’s Education Association of 
Boston, of which Mrs. Palmer was president, took 
up the matter of endowment with enthusiasm, ap- 


CAMBRIDGE 237 


pointing her chairman of a small committee charged 
to raise the contemplated sum. To this endeavor 
her winter of 1893-94 was largely given. By letters, 
by arranged interviews, and most of all by personal 
solicitation she, in company with a friend or two, 
canvassed Boston and many more distant places. 
Persuasions of hers were never easy to resist, and 
before the end of the winter she had obtained over 
$90,000. When, however, the question came before 
the Harvard Corporation, they decided by a majority 
of one to require Radcliffe to give its own degrees, 
President Eliot favoring the opposite policy. The 
money raised by Mrs. Palmer was accordingly 
returned to the subscribers. A few years later she 
aided in raising $110,000 for Wellesley. 

Having so strong an interest in every type of wo- 
men’s college, Mrs. Palmer naturally gave much time 
to fostering the Collegiate Alumnz Association. 
This is a league of women graduated from the better 
colleges throughout the country, who are banded 
together for educational and friendly purposes. It 
seeks to sort the colleges which are open to women, to 
fix standards of excellence, and to bring pressure to 
bear on those of a low order and induce them to raise 
their requirements. No college is admitted to mem- 
bership which does not reach a certain grade in 
entrance examinations, in number and efficiency of 
teachers, in size of endowment and library, and in 


238 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


conditions for the Bachelor’s degree. ‘The certificate 
of membership consequently becomes proof that its 
holder is a student of sound training. It is accepted 
at the universities both of this country and Europe, 
and admits a woman to higher study without further 
examination. Mrs. Palmer was one of the original 
organizers of this association, and one of its early 
presidents. Throughout her life she attended its 
meetings and served on its two laborious committees, 
the committee on membership and the committee on 
foreign fellowships; the length of her many terms of 
service in its various offices, if added together, aggre- 
gating fifty-three years. Foreign fellowships she felt 
to be matters of such importance that she spent 
much time in sifting the candidates, corresponded 
with them while they were abroad, and often raised 
considerable sums for their support. Since her death 
a fellowship of this sort has been founded in her 
name by the Collegiate Alumne Association; and 
another, also called by her name and yielding an 
income of $1000, has been put in charge of Wellesley 
College. 

1 have mentioned the Woman’s Education Asso- 
ciation, a hard-working body to which Mrs. Palmer 
gave many years of fruitful service. Certain public- 
spirited ladies of Boston had banded themselves 
together “to promote the better education of 
women.’’ By this phrase they meant not the support 


CAMBRIDGE 239 


of educational agencies already established, but the 
more difficult business of watchfulness, invention, 
and experiment. It was theirs to initiate move- 
ments, to finance them for a time, testing them 
carefully; and then when they were proved to have 
worth, to turn them over to independent organiza- 
tions. In this way they opened opportunities to 
women in many directions previously unthought of. 
Under their charge and at their cost Harvard Uni- 
versity was induced to conduct a series of examina- 
tions for girls graduating from preparatory and 
high schools, examinations which were afterwards 
put in charge of Radcliffe College. For them the 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology opened its 
chemical laboratories. They aided the study of 
biology by providing means for seaside summer 
work, out of which germ was developed the im- 
portant marine station at Wood’s Hole. To them 
too were due the beginnings of the training of dis- 
trict nurses, the study of home economics, the diet 
kitchen, emergency lectures, sloyd, travelling li- 
braries. They founded foreign fellowships, looked 
after city schools, the vacations of working girls, the 
poor, the deaf, the trees on Boston Common — in 
short interested themselves in all those matters 
where women’s watchfulness can increase the in- 
telligence, beauty, and dignity of a city. 

In 1891 this society had fallen into decay. Its 


240 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


meetings were slenderly attended and the question of 
disbanding arose. Finally it was decided to continue 
if Mrs. Palmer would accept the presidency. It was 
usually her habit to listen too readily to calls of this 
sort, and mine to be fierce in opposition. Her kind 
heart was so easily solicited that for her protection 
a certain savagery was sometimes necessary. But in 
this case our parts were reversed. I saw in the soci- 
ety a power which, if properly directed, might pro- 
duce much; but she proved strangely obdurate. By 
degrees it appeared that, while she did not know 
these ladies, she imagined them rich, cold, and fash- 
ionable, likely to be alarmed over woman suffrage 
and coeducation, “not at all her kind.’ She, a Wes- 
tern girl, could never work well with people of that 
sort, she said, nor could they possibly have any liking 
for her. 

I hardly know how she came at last to accept their 
presidency for a single year; but once in, she was 
unanimously reélected in nine successive years. She 
herself soon discovered her mistaken estimate, and 
nowhere did she ever find a company more loyal or 
congenial. The Association sprang into vigorous 
life. Its membership enormously increased, its 
meetings were largely attended; and while wide 
differences of opinion continued among its members 
over the proper scope of woman’s activity, all shades 
of belief were respected and its committees aided - 


CAMBRIDGE 241 


pretty diverse causes. Where Mrs. Palmer was, 
quarrelling was usually difficult, frankness and mu- 
tual consideration easy. But she worked hard. I 
find in her notebooks memoranda of six public meet- 
ings and six executive committee meetings a winter, 
at all of which she presided. For the public meetings 
subjects must be selected and notable speakers 
obtained. And though no one could have been more 
efficiently supported than she, it was inevitable that 
much of the care of planning the varied work of the 
Association should fall upon her. The year before 
she went abroad for the last time, she insisted on her 
resignation being accepted, for she did not think it 
well that a society should be too long under a single 
leader. 

And since in passing I have mentioned woman’s 
suffrage, perhaps I shall save Mrs. Palmer from 
misconception if I indicate more precisely her atti- 
tude toward that heated question. Both she and I 
were members of the Equal Suffrage Association 
and had no doubt that eventually women will vote 
as naturally and with as little disturbance to the 
community as do men. She knew many of the lead- 
ing suffragists and admired them for their refinement, 
their patience, and their readiness to bear abuse in 
the public interest. Such dispositions she counted 
admirably feminine. Whenever she came home after 
meeting sensible Mary Livermore, or sweet-voiced 


242 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Lucy Stone, or perpetually youthful Julia Ward 
Howe, a new nobility seemed communicated to her- 
self. Yet she did not appear on their platforms nor 
press the legislature to grant their great request. 
While never concealing her sympathies, and agree- 
ing with a remark made to her by Phillips Brooks, 
that “it frightened him to see what civic govern- 
ment had come to, unaided by women,” she felt 
that the movement toward suffrage was advancing 
with great — perhaps with sufficient — rapidity. 
She was eager, before it reached its conclusion, to 
give women juster minds, sounder bodies, more 
equable nerves, and a clearer consciousness of them- 
selves as something more than pretty creatures of 
society. These were the important matters; suffrage 
but an auxiliary, though worthy, crown. It could 
wait, they could not. ‘Then too these were the in- 
terests_ specifically intrusted to her, and into the 
furtherance of them she threw herself with a whole- 
hearted zeal which was not easily diverted to side 
issues. 


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In 1889 Mrs. Palmer was appointed by Governor 
Ames a member of the Massachusetts State Board of 
Education. ‘This position she held during the re- 
maining thirteen years of her life, being reappointed 
by Governor Greenhalge and Governor Crane, until 
she became the senior member of the Board. The 
Board consists of eight members and has direct con- 
trol of the normal schools only; but indirectly and 
through oversight it influences all the public instruc- 
tion of the state. At its instance new legislation is 
initiated or, still more important, prevented. In the 
annual report of its secretary statistics of the schools 
are given and their condition elaborately set forth. 
It employs half a dozen agents to visit the schools 
of the isolated sections, to learn about their strength 
and weakness, and to give friendly advice to the 
teachers. Under their direction some twenty-five 
Teachers’ Institutes, a sort of migratory normal 
school, are held each year. At these the teachers of 
the country towns, for the most part women, assem- 
ble for acquaintance, criticism, and guidance. Long 


Q44 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


regular meetings of the Board are held each month; 
special meetings as often as business requires. 

To this oversight of the public schools Mrs. Palmer 
devoted an incalculable amount of time, tact, and 
experience. She visited, corresponded, interviewed, 
served on committees, appealed to the legislature, 
and with such success that at her death the normal 
schools, and to a great extent the country schools also, 
had been reorganized and brought to an efficiency 
unknown before. In 1902 the Secretary of the 
Board could truthfully write that “in qualifications 
for admission to its normal schools no state has yet 
adopted standards so high or so satisfactory.” 

No one would profess that these important changes 
were due to Mrs. Palmer alone. That was seldom 
true of any of her undertakings. I have a constant 
difficulty in narrating what she did, because it is 
always tangled with what others did and cannot 
be separately assessed. From the beginning her 
public career was one of association and of work 
accomplished in groups. Nothing pleased her more 
than so to escape observation and, while giving of 
her best, to have it merged in the indistinguishable 
best of others. On the State Board too she found 
strong colleagues and a ready spirit of codperation. 
My only method therefore of describing this labori- 
ous section of her life is to set down the improve- 
ments in the schools which were effected during her 


CAMBRIDGE 245 


term of office, and to say that in these improvements 
her prudent mind, persuasive tongue, and resource- 
ful courage bore no inconsiderable part. 

During her time the Massachusetts Normal Schools 
were increased from six to ten, and all the original 
six were equipped with new buildings. To get the 
bills passed, locations selected, plans of buildings 
drawn and executed for ten great plants, is no slight 
job. Faithfulness in public service involves a good 
many plodding hours. But the internal reconstruc- 
tion was more significant still. Its successive steps 
were, I believe, the following. In 1893 the permanent 
Secretary of the Board —a devoted man, of some 
limitations, who had kept the old system steady for 
seventeen years — retired, and the earlier concep- 
tion of a normal school as a place of general 
education which might well be substituted for the 
high school came to an end. Thenceforth only 
high school graduates were admitted to the normal 
schools, where they immediately began to devote 
themselves to professional study. Before, students 
had been allowed to end their work in winter or 
summer; for the future a single graduation in June 
was fixed, and the course was solidly organized with 
reference to a definite date. More careful examina- 
tions for entrance and graduation were established. 
The traditional period of study had been but two 
years. In 1897 the schools at which Mrs. Palmer 


246 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


was a visitor, Bridgewater and Hyannis, had both 
lengthened their courses, and in that year a gen- 
eral vote was passed permitting the visitors and 
principal of any normal school to add to its course 
a third year of study and practice. It will be under- 
stood too that these larger changes were accompanied 
by a multitude of impalpable ones, in short by a 
general elevation of scholarly ideals. And this spirit 
was the more readily brought about because of an 
excellent provision for personal contact which had 
always existed. By a rule of the Board each of its 
members has two schools under his or her immediate 
charge. ‘These he is expected frequently to visit, to 
become acquainted with their needs and teachers, to 
preside at their graduations, and to write an annual 
report on their condition. Membership on the State 
Board of Education, though unpaid, is no sine- 
cure. 

I have said that the Board did not confine itself 
to normal schools. In the year that Mrs. Palmer 
joined it a bill was passed encouraging the employ- 
ment by all country schools of superintendents 
instead of local committees, allowing neighboring 
towns to combine in employing such a superinten- 
dent, and furnishing grants from the state treasury to 
meet part of the expense. A more important measure 
was carried in 1891 and greatly extended in 1894. 
This opened free high schools to our whole popu: 


CAMBRIDGE Q47 


lation, for it provided that a child in any town where 
there is no high school may claim free tuition at the 
school of a neighboring town. In 1894, too, examina- 
tions were established under the State Board to test 
the qualifications of candidates for teachers in the 
elementary schools. The following year manual 
training, of a type to be approved by the Board, was 
required in all high schools. The general aim of 
these changes was to put within the reach of the 
country child opportunities for development similar 
to those which the city child enjoys. In all this bene- 
ficent upbuilding of the schools Mrs. Palmer was a 
tireless worker. In view of what she did, her grateful 
colleagues have entered on their records the sense 
of loss her death occasioned to the Commonwealth 
and have added that always “her first concern was 
for the children of the state, that they should have 
the best facilities for the acquisition of knowledge, 
the training of their intellectual powers, and the 
development of their characters; her next was for 
the teachers, especially those in the humbler places, 
that everything should be done to make their calling 
comfortable and dignified. She was courageous 
before committees of the legislature in advocating 
the measures deemed wise by the Board and in seek- 
ing to avoid the evils of mischievous legislation.” 
But how heavy a burden this work for the state laid 
on her will easily be understood. 


248 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


It was during her membership on this board that 
she came forward in defence of the schools against 
improper temperance teaching. One of the more 
extreme temperance organizations attempted to put 
text-books into the schools which should paint the 
effects of alcohol in colors dark enough to terrify all 
users. Mrs. Palmer believed these books to be pleas, 
and not scientific statements. She thought them 
exaggerated, unfitted to train a child’s sense of truth, 
and therefore unlikely in the long run to effect their 
purpose. With that purpose she was in hearty agree- 
ment. She believed it had been proved that alcohol 
is physically injurious; she knew that it had a closer 
alliance with human misery than any other agent 
known to man; and both she and her parents had 
long supported legal control of the traffic. Yet with 
her usual courage she faced misconception, led the 
State Board in opposing the measure, fought it for 
several weeks in legislative committees, and finaliy 
killed the bill. One of her colleagues has said, “She 
was the most persuasive debater I ever knew.” 

Much time during the winters of 1891 and 1892 
was given to preparing for the Columbian Exposition 
at Chicago. To plan and conduct there an exhibit for 
Massachusetts a board of managers was appointed 
by the Governor, and of the five constituting it Mrs. 
Palmer was one. Several meetings of this board 
were held each month. There was a building to be 


CAMBRIDGE 249 


constructed, exhibits to be gathered, loans of his- 
torical articles to be solicited, public interest to be 
aroused. ‘The managers had the aid of a pecu- 
liarly efficient executive commissioner; but as Mrs. 
Palmer at this period was often in Chicago on uni- 
versity duty, no little responsibility at the fair grounds 
fell upon her. With the opening of the fair social 
functions began. ‘Then too Massachusetts made 
education an important feature of its exhibit, and 
this required the special oversight of Mrs. Palmer. 
Partly through her influence the state collections on 
this subject were afterwards gathered into a perma- 
nent educational museum. On the whole, Massa- 
chusetts made an exceptionally complete and beau- 
tiful showing at the fair; but it was managed with 
such watchfulness and regard for public interests 
that at its close the managers were able to turn back 
into the state treasury more than a fifth of the not 
large appropriation voted by the legislature. 

When the fair was projected many women’s organ- 
izations throughout the country thought the occasion 
a favorable one for showing what had recently been 
accomplished by their neglected half of our race. 
They accordingly equipped a building with an ex- 
cellent exhibit of the products of women’s work, 
extending all the way from the nursery to the fine 
arts. But Mrs. Palmer did not joi them. In her 
view the dignified position of man and woman is in 


250 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


comradeship, and not in places apart. She gladly 
saw the exhibits of Wellesley and Radcliffe installed 
beside those of the men’s colleges, and took even more 
satisfaction in what the coeducational colleges could 
show. 

To several other boards she gave brief terms of 
service. For many years she was one of the two 
hundred and fifty corporate members of the American 
Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, in 
company with only six other women. Soon after she 
came to Cambridge, she was made President of the 
Woman’s Home Missionary Association and found 
in its wide affairs a happy blending of her religious, 
charitable, patriotic, and educational aims. Its work 
is largely among women and children. Into the out- 
lying parts of our country, where agencies of civiliza- 
tion are few, it carries material aid, intellectual 
instruction, and divine hopes. Such a body needs 
from time to time the impulse of a fresh, though 
experienced, executive; and this it found in Mrs. 
Palmer. During her period of office contributions 
were increased and stolid audiences stirred to help-< 
fulness by her moving accounts of hardship and 
heroism. But to remain at the head of this congenial 
organization would have removed her too far from 
the business of education for which she was specifi- 
cally trained. She therefore held the presidency for 
only three years, remaining however a vice-president 


CAMBRIDGE 251 


throughout her life. It was often her way, when she 
was unable to engage continuously in tasks which 
she counted important, to throw herself into them 
for a time and, after imparting her own enthusiasm 
and business methods to those about her, to leave 
on their hands the execution of what she had planned. 
Perhaps her most useful characteristic was this 
ability to inspire and to deputize. 

When the war with Spain was over, a strangely 
friendly feeling toward that country appeared 
among our people. On our streets one could hardly 
say which was the more popular admiral, Dewey or 
Cervera. To show kindness where we had been 
obliged to use force, and to offer help to a nation 
trying to extricate itself from bonds of the past, was 
the desire of the hour. Everybody felt it. To the 
Cubans in 1900 Harvard opened freely its lecture 
rooms, and Mrs. Palmer her home. The sixteen 
Cuban girls who spent the summer there were under 
the charge of a remarkable woman, Mrs. Alice 
Gordon Gulick. After many years of work in Spain 
as a missionary, she had laid the foundations at San 
Sebastian of an International Institute designed to 
give Spanish girls such opportunity for advanced 
instruction as is offered in our colleges and academies. 
She knew very well that intellectual desires among 
women were as yet hardly astir in Spain, and that 
the work of awakening them would be a long one. 


252 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


It was foreseen that most of the necessary funds 
must come from America. But Mrs. Gulick had 
much of Mrs. Palmer’s patient and stimulating 
power, and already had made for herself something 
of a name in Spain. When the war was over the 
International Institute was reorganized, Mrs. Palmer 
becoming its president and Admiral Sampson one 
of its directors. Grounds and a building were ob- 
tained in Madrid, money for further development 
was solicited, the girls’ colleges of this country were 
pledged to aid, and one or two slender classes were 
graduated. Just as the prospects of ultimate success 
were bright, Mrs. Palmer died, and her death was 
soon followed by that of Mrs. Gulick, exhausted in 
the cause. But enough had already been accom- 
plished by these ardent women to mark the path 
along which others might safely carry onward the 
intended gift to Spain. 

Not until the first half of the nineteenth century 
did it occur to Americans that girls as well as boys 
would profit by the higher education. Even then 
nothing so revolutionary as college training was 
planned; but a peculiar sort of advanced school, 
called a seminary or academy, began to appear in 
which it was sought to “finish” a girl by giving her 
just that amount of acquaintance with intellectual 
things which would quiet her mind without upset- 
ting it, and without in any way damaging her attrac« 


CAMBRIDGE 253 


tion for man. One of the earliest and best of these 
venturesome schools was Bradford Academy, thirty 
miles from Boston, From 1804 to 1836 it admitted 
boys and girls; after 1836, girls only. For more than 
half a century it had an honorable career, but then 
declined until its numbers were insufficient to main- 
tain its plant. Such schools almost inevitably move 
toward decay and by a kind of natural development 
tend to supersede themselves. The rising desire for 
knowledge which they meet and stimulate passes 
beyond them; and unless they are readjusted to 
modern conditions, they cease to hold the place in 
the community which was once rightfully theirs. 
Bradford reached such a crisis in 1900, when its 
despairing trustees turned to Mrs. Palmer. They 
wanted her to enter their board and join in an effort 
of resurrection. In view of the amount of her other 
work, she hesitated ; but at last, finding that the first 
requisite for a successful school, a strong head, could 
not be had unless she became a trustee, she con- 
sented. For the two years before she died Bradford 
was one of her principal cares. During this time it 
passed from obscurity to a degree of public favor 
as great as it had ever known. Able men and women 
joined its board of trustees; its methods of study 
were modernized; its teachers were increased and 
their salaries raised ; its debt was checked ; it attracted 
as many students as its rooms could hold; and a way 


254 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


was prepared for the enlargement which has gone on 
since her death. In this case, as in many others, the 
remarkable results cannot be called hers. Many 
earnest men and women joined in producing them. 
But wherever she came, earnest men and women 
were pretty sure to appear and io find such success 
in their undertakings as they had previously believed 
impossible. 

When I was in Venice in the summer of 1905, I 
needed help in a little Italian business. Learning 
that a certain lady might furnish it, I applied to her. 
She doubted if she had the necessary time. I pressed. 
‘Though she spoke no English, she said she had some 
acquaintance with America and began to inquire 
who I was. I reported myself a Harvard professor, 
but she remained obstinate. Incidentally I men- 
tioned that my wife was formerly president of 
Wellesley College. ‘Then all barriers went down. Was 
I the husband of Alice Freeman Palmer? She was 
adored in Italy. Poor Italians coming to America 
had been badly plundered. Attempts had been made 
in several cities to start a society for their protection, 
but with little success, until in Boston it had been 
suggested that Mrs. Palmer should head the move- 
ment. Then difficulties disappeared. I was obliged 
to say that I knew nothing of all this. Only two inci~ 
dents connected with it could I subsequently recall. 
One day, in the year she went abroad for the last 


CAMBRIDGE 255 


time, I picked up from her desk a circular appealing 
for the protection of Italian immigrants. Making 
some slurring remark about the absurdity of sending 
such things to an educational expert, I tossed the 
paper down. She was silent. A little later a letter 
came, addressed to her as president of the league 
for the protection of Italian immigrants. Then I 
broke into hot remonstrance. Was she, when already 
strained by Bradford and much else, so reckless as 
to go outside her province and take up something for 
which she had no special knowledge or fitness? She 
glanced up from her writing and gently said that I 
was taking things quite too seriously. She did not 
usually travel far from her own field, nor had she 
any idea now of giving important time to outside 
affairs. ‘These people certainly were in a pitiful case, 
and some of her friends had asked her to lend her 
name for theiraid. ‘That was all. She might preside 
at a public meeting or two, but could give little 
further attention to the matter. She never mentioned 
the subject again. How much she may have done I 
do not know to-day. But three years after she had 
left our earth I came on the tracks of her quiet good 
deeds in far-away Venice. 

Being known to have uncommon administrative 
talents and entire readiness to place them at the ser- 
vice of whoever needed them, she became during 
these years in Cambridge a kind of educational 


256 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


adviser. Schools and colleges all over the country 
turned to her in their perplexities, seldom in vain. 
She knew the right candidate to recommend for 
professor, dean, trustee, or even president, and 
she chose him with singular adaptation to his en- 
vironment. In discussing problems of administration 
she was ingenious in suggestion, divining by a kind 
of instinct what would or would not work under the 
given circumstances. Only the circumstances must 
be actual, in order to bring out her best powers of 
judgment. Give her a theoretic problem in educa- 
tional tactics, and you might find her uninterested 
and get a commonplace reply. But let her feel a 
living school or college in difficulty, and she would 
almost immediately perceive some shrewd way out. 
This dangerous sagacity overwhelmed her with cor- 
respondence, a correspondence so personal that she 
generally preferred to conduct it with her own pen. 
As soon as she entered the house she sat down at her 
desk, where she remained pretty steadily until sum- 
moned by callers. Calls of a formal sort she did not 
herself make, but only calls of business and occa- 
sionally of refreshment. During one of her busiest 
winters she spent half an hour each week with the 
two children of a Boston friend. ‘Throwing herself 
on the floor, she built block houses with them, told 
stories, or dallied with Noah’s Ark, until the clock 
announced a committee meeting. But calls on her- 


CAMBRIDGE 257 


self were regarded as even more sacred than letters. 
She reserved an afternoon a week for them, besides 
having them distributed through all other days. 
Nobody was dismissed briefly. By her fireside one 
got the impression that time was lazily abundant. I 
think she did not know a bore when she saw him — 
and she saw him under every guise. Sometimes he © 
appeared as the crazy schemer, anxious to hitch his 
rickety wagon to her auspicious star. Even then, 
while protected by her own good sense, she would 
not damage that self-confidence which was his only 
possession. ‘These direct contacts with persons 
through calls and letters she valued extremely; and 
large as was the draft they made on her time, they 
were probably worth while. To them she had been 
disciplined at Wellesley, and by them she recreated 
many a human soul. 

I have said nothing about her public speeches, for 
the truth is I have rarely heard them. Whenever she 
spoke I was obliged to have an important engagement 
elsewhere. Her banishment of me was not through 
timidity, I think. Few speakers have so little of that. 
But in addressing an audience, she used to say, she 
must speak to all and not to any single one among 
them. Yet again and again some obscure person from 
her audience has told me that it seemed as if all she 
said was intended for him alone, such penetrating 
intimacy was in her words. Quietly they fell, as if in 


258 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


her own library; the simple language touched with 
a strange veracity, the clinging voice modulated so 
that the farthest auditor listened with pleasure; while 
the swift sentences unfolded her theme smoothly, tact- 
fully, often humorously; anecdote, argument, home- 
thrust, or thrilling passage within easy command, 
and all welded together so solidly and with so little 
self-consciousness that at the close it seemed im- 
possible to take any other view of the subject than 
the one presented. President Angell has said that 
“few speakers have in so large measure as she that 
magnetic unanalyzable power, divinely given now 
and then to some fortunate man or woman, of cap- 
tivating and charming and holding complete posses- 
sion of assemblies from the first to the last utterance.” 

Rarely was she fatigued while speaking. She was 
too much absorbed for that, and she followed what 
was said as eagerly as any who listened. But she 
ordinarily came home despondent. ‘To my inquiry 
how things had gone, “ Wretchedly,” she would say. 
“Why did you let me accept that invitation?” And 
just before an address she was often equally down- 
hearted. She would come hurrying into the house, 
saying she had a speech to make in Boston the next 
hour and nothing to make it of. What should she do? 
And how foolish she had been to promise it three 
months before! In later years these things gave me 
little alarm; for I found her speeches were not made 


CAMBRIDGE 259 


ex tempore, but ex omni tempore, from a rich experi- 
ence and with a delicate sense of literary form. Her 
best place for preparing them was on the street, in 
contact with people, and before an audience. But in 
the early years I did not understand these inspired 
processes, and thought my wooden ways universally 
applicable. Shortly after we married she had an 
address to make of more than usual importance. 
When the time was only a month distant, I asked if 
she had selected her subject? She said she should 
do so soon. After another fortnight I began to press 
on her the importance of making notes. But callers 
happened to be numerous just then and commit- 
tees urgent. When but three more days were left, I 
became positively miserable and made her about 
equally so. She shut herself up in her room the last 
day and spent its wretched hours in fruitless medi- 
tation. I saw when she left me for the hall that she 
was thoroughly disorganized, and she told me —I 
believe truthfully — that she went to pieces on the 
platform. Several persons inquired of me what had 
been the matter that day with Mrs. Palmer. I knew 
too well: the trouble was meddling I. Henceforth 
I trusted her temperament, and I do not think she 
ever again made so bad a failure. 

From her notebooks I learn that there were years 
in which these public addresses ran as high as forty. 
Seldom would they average less than one a fort- 


260 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


night. Many weeks contained several. She enjoyed 
them all, as she did everything; enjoyed meeting the 
people after the lecture, enjoyed inspecting the schools 
or towns where she spoke, enjoyed managing a de- 
mure country audience and conducting it decorously 
to a smile. Her subjects were generally taken from 
some phase of girls’ education, occasionally from her 
experiences abroad or at home, or from a book she 
had been reading. I believe the majority of her 
addresses were unpaid, as were all the employments 
recorded in this chapter with the single exception of 
the Chicago deanship. | 
Such were some of the larger occupations of Mrs. 
Palmer’s busy winters. ‘The lesser ones I leave un- 
named. Each autumn, in company with the Catholic 
priest, she engaged in that temperance campaign 
by which Cambridge has held unshaken for a long 
series of years its policy of No License. In each of 
the later Springs there were vacation schools to be 
organized and suitable play-grounds to be provided. 
Once a fortnight came the merry suppers of er 
sewing society, the ancient Cambridge “ Bee.”” Each 
Friday Harvard students were met in Brooks House 
by Faculty wives; each Saturday in Boston the clever 
girls of the College Club expected her, their presi- 
dent for two years, at their afternoon tea. But every 
one knows how the occupations which devour time 
are either those petty matters which keep our hum- 


CAMBRIDGE 261 


drum world in motion, or else the erratic incalculable 
affairs which break into our regularities to-day and, 
because not likely to appear to-morrow, do for the 
moment claim exclusive attention. Of either we keep 
no chronicle. Yet a single serious one of the latter 
sort deserves mention. It fell on Mrs. Palmer in 
November, 1898, and cost her most of that winter. 
As she stepped from a street car opposite her door, 
a bicycle rider whirled round a neighboring corner 
and, before either could pause and with little fault 
on either side, struck her squarely, dashing her head 
against a paving stone. Complete consciousness did 
not return for twelve hours, and for a time perma- 
nent injury to the brain was feared. During the slow 
recovery she was much touched, and queerly sur- 
prised, by the expressions of sympathy which came 
to her from all parts of the country. Weakness re- 
mained for about a year, and her dark hair began to 
turn gray. But rest is medicinal, and Mrs. Palmer 
was not without the important ability to shirk. At 
the right moment she could sew, play, or take refuge 
in Boxford, leaving letters unanswered and commit- 
tees unattended. Courage, a quiet mind, and a little 
nonchalance will heal much. By the time of her 
death all effects of the accident had passed away. 
This account of Mrs. Palmer’s busy winters may 
easily convey an erroneous impression. It is intended 
to be descriptive merely, not didactic. In it I have 


262 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


tried to depict Mrs. Palmer’s working season, not to 
offer a program for persons in general. Let some 
women read the account with horror, rendered 
doubly thankful that they were born for the drawing 
room and easy chair. Let others be quickened in 
their own diverse professions and enter into them 
with the greater devotion because of Mrs. Palmer’s 
labors. Let the plain housekeeper learn here how 
even under pressure one may keep cool, happy, and 
hardly in haste. Let each one draw from this story 
whatever moral it has for him or for her. With such 
uses of it I am not concerned. My business is simply 
to set forth a nature somewhat unusual, endowed 
with great powers whose exercise brought constant 
pleasure; endowed with a heart which could not be 
happy alone; with an originality that struck out its 
own ways of working and freshened every little act 
along its path; and with a piety that hourly hungered 
and thirsted after righteousness. In this season of 
what I have called her self-expression, delight and 
duty moved hand in hand. Each heavy-laden morn- 
ing opened to her its opportunities and sent her forth 
gladly to meet its “ good times.’ She would certainly 
never have wished others to follow in her track, but 
only to be earnest and joyous in their own. Laziness 
and conventionality she did indeed abhor, and 
thought most people only half awake. She liked to 
live in every fibre of her being, and so she vitalized 


CAMBRIDGE 263 


all around. Yet her capacious life is only half re- 
ported in this chapter. As she conceived it, it was to 
hold both cares and carelessness. The prodigal win- 
ters of Cambridge were rendered possible by the 
supplemental peace of Boxford. To that contrasted 
spot let us now remove. 


LETTERS 


Is n’t it strange that now in September, just after 
coming from abroad, I should be passing through 
Wellesley on the opening day of the College? There 
all must be turmoil and bustle, and ordinarily I 
should be going to the waiting work. Now I am 
flying to peaceful Boxford, with no wish to turn back 
to the old days. Yet as I speed along the familiar 
way, and my train at last dashes past the station, 
leaving the college towers in the distance, my feelings 
are too mixed to analyze. I only know that there is 
in them no touch of regret that the train does not 
leave me there. You are better than any college; to 
be your wife a higher position than the princess held 
in the days before you came and made her a queen. 


This morning as I sat at work here at home Dr. 
F. threw open the door, led in an invalid girl whom 
he has been watching for several weeks, and said, 
“Lizzie is nineteen to-day, and I thought she would 
like to see the pretty things you brought from Eu- 


264 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


rope.” She has been holding the white lace dress 
in her lap all the afternoon. Her soft black eyes 
followed me about like Stella’s, and her cough was 
sadly familiar. Her mother has just died of consump- 
tion, and she cannot live through the winter. When 
she went away, she put out her thin hands and said, 
“You have been very good to me. Won’t you forget 
that you never saw me before, and let me kiss you?” 
Oh dear, how sad the world is! Why can’t I put the 
white lace on her pretty form and send her out to 
find a lover like mine, and health and happiness with 
him? 


1 have missed you again. All day I have been 
presiding at the annual meeting of the Home Mis- 
sionary Board in Park Street Church, the largest 
meeting the Association has ever held. At its close 
we contributed $800 to send another teacher to 
Dakota. I would gladly make an appointment for 
the morning; but I returned from New York late last 
night, and was at this meeting from nine until five 
o'clock to-day. A pile of letters demands immediate 
answers, and to-morrow at three o’clock the Ex- 
ecutive Committee of Wellesley meets in Boston. 
Before or after that meeting I shall try to find you. 


This is the first time I have been up long enough 
to write a note since Saturday. Last week I took a 


CAMBRIDGE 265 


heavy cold, and perhaps I was tired. But I am all 
right now, or soon shall be. Your little card to-night 
brings tears to my eyes. I must see you. If I were n’t 
afraid it would be better for you to have no one 
under your roof except your ownest ones, I should 
surely, surely, be with you at once. I believe I could 
smooth the aches out of your head and put you to 
sleep as if you were a little child. I know how, and 
love you enough to be able to do it. Won’t you tell 
me something I may do for you? May I come some 
day and tell you a pretty story? 

But no! AsIwrite,I succumb. I shall go to-mor- 
row. Tell your watchers and defenders that I won’t 
speak, not a word! I'll only look; can’t they trust me? 
Did they ever hear me talk much? Don’t they know 
that I haven’t any ideas left? Besides, I have a cold, 
and the doctor does n’t allow me to say anything. I 
want to receive the pretty cushion you have made 
for me, stuffed with love and sewed with tenderness, 
from the very hands that made it. My head aches 
for it, and my heart — well, Longfellow said his was 
“hot and restless.” Perhaps that is what I should 
say of mine if I were a poet. It is n’t prudent for me 
to go out to-day — but to-morrow ? 


The time draws near for your speech. I am glad 
it comes on the first day of the festival, before you 
get tired. Then you will have it off your mind. Keep 


266 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


yourself fresh and calm until you have spoken, and 
then you can mingle with the people. What are you 
going to wear? You must tell me all about it when 
it is over, and you have had one good night’s sleep. 

As for the speech itself, it will make all the differ- 
ence in the world how you say it. If you are heard 
distinctly, and your manner is cordial and earnest 
and unaffected, it will be a success. I would break 
up the first sentences a little. A speech is more effec- 
tive if its early sentences are short. But this is a 
good one. I have thrown in a few quotations which 
I thought would be telling. Use them or not, as you 
please. 


How in the world did you learn about Chicago? 
I trusted no whisper would reach you until I could 
speak. And I have been in bed for two weeks, am 
indeed just crawling about to-day. How I have 
longed for Florida or any haven of escape from 
Cambridge winds and dust! So I have planned little 
since President Harper was here three weeks ago. 
T have n’t been willing to worry anybody in case we 
should not accept. But about this we ourselves don’t 
know yet. We shall probably go to Chicago next 
week, during Harvard’s Easter recess, look the 
ground over, and then decide as soon as possible. 
Of course I need n’t say that we don’t want to go. 
For almost every reason we prefer to stay just where 


CAMBRIDGE 267 


we are. Undoubtedly it would be pleasanter and 
more useful to have $12,000 a year instead of four. 
And there are superb chances of work out there — 
how superb people here don’t understand. What 
shall we do? 


I am sorry to hear you speak sadly of your life 
and its small results, though what you say finds an 
echo in all our hearts when we stop to think of the 
gulf between our aspiration and accomplishment. 
The one comfort is that we do not know much about 
that accomplishment. I fancy you do not see your 
child grow from Sunday to Sunday. The child her-. 
self does n’t know that she has grown at all. But 
with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a: 
thousand years as one day. And indeed I wonder 
what more duties you could ask than those you are 
fulfilling so bravely. In the end I believe your town 
will be a better place because you live in it; and if 
so, all Maine and New England and our struggling 
world, that swings so slowly onward. Take heart, 
and let God bless all your life as wife and mother 
and daughter and friend and neighbor. You can’t 
help being a strong influence quite unconsciously. 

But consciously also you may help to think out. 
help for many. Especially now as a mother, you can 
take thought for the children all about you and see 
that they have wholesome surroundings to grow in.. 


268 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


That is much on my mind of late. We comfortable 
women should do more than merely give to charities, 
hospitals, etc. We can keep the streets and school- 
houses clean and make half the diseases vanish. 
From our own blessed homes we can help to make 
the whole city a happy home for the little children 
who now hardly have homes at all. Why, what a 
fortunate woman you are! If I had a little daughter, 
it seems to me I should be proud to devote my whole 
time to her and her father and her home, and to 
sweetening her native town for her to live in. 

But I am glad you are taking up music and are 
reading French and Dante. All this will keep a girl’s 
heart in you, and an open mind, and make you 
fresher and gladder in your home. You will want 
your daughter to feel that you are a student too, 
when she becomes one, and that the learning is never 
done as long as we are in God’s wonderful world. 
What a difference it will make when all our mothers 
have such relations with their children, besides the 
life of love! 


We have been talking over your letter, and feel 
pretty certain that you ought not to give up your 
excellent place and devote yourself to your brother 
and his child. That would not be fair either to your- 
self or to him. He ought not to allow it. In the 
nature of things his plans must be very uncertain, 


CAMBRIDGE 269 


while this is a critical period in your life. If just at 
your age you abandon your present opportunity for 
large influence and usefulness, withdrawing from 
scholarly work and surroundings, you will find after 
a few years that you cannot take it up anew. He in 
the mean time may marry again. He ought to be 
free to do so. But in that case you will be left without 
occupation or interest. I have seen this happen pain- 
fully often. No! Go on making your life as strong 
and valuable as you can. Have Nellie with you for 
a while and then put her into a good school. By and 
by that will be the very best thing for her. An only 
child needs school life earlier than other children. 
Your present opportunity is an admirable one. 
Of course you must engage in it prudently, taking 
care of your health all the time. But when you are 
occupied with so beautiful a piece of work, your 
health is likely of itself to grow firmer. You seem to 
have been trusted as few women are; and that is “a 
call.” It is a great thing to have won such confidence. 
It constitutes a capital. Into this work you can gather 
all your past experience and carry it straight on. 
You must not “shrink before the bigness of the 
task.’’ That is what Wellesley has been trying to fit 
her daughters for, and you must not fail her when 
a chance for leadership comes. ‘This is a remarka- 
ble offer, and in that very fact lies large promise of 
success. Of course no one can decide for you, espe- 


270 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


cially if you feel no inner inclination. To me you 
seem well fitted. So many college women have no 
gift for executive work that those who have are the 
more necessary, if that important work is to be 
done. 

I see you hesitate about abandoning your studies 
for a higher degree. Many young men and women 
are making a fetich of the Ph.D., letting splendid. 
chances go by, as if that were an end in itself. It is 
a sad mistake, both for them and for society in gen- 
eral. Unless you have some definite scheme in mind, 
of long and patient research, you will not bring out 
results of consequence. Studying interesting ques-, 
tions among pleasant people is always agreeable, 
but it does n’t make a life. My impression is that you 
are enough like me to prefer active work and direct. 
influence to the solitary scholar’s career. If I am. 
right, you should not sacrifice a great opportunity 
for service, in case it appeals to you, for a little more 
lingering in lecture rooms and libraries. 


A friend said to me the other day that women are 
already so occupied with the higher duties of life 
that they have no time to attend to political duties. 
She thought political duties would interfere with 
the proper execution of these higher ones, and rightly | 
insisted that no such interference must be allowed. 
What then are the political duties? What are the, 


CAMBRIDGE Q71 


higher duties? How far does the one kind obstruct 
or assist the other? 

The political duties are informing one’s self on 
the state of the country, on policies at issue, on 
candidates for office, and then going to the polls and 
depositing a ballot. The so-called higher duties are 
the bearing and rearing of children, while making 
a home for family and friends. 

How much time must a woman spend on her 
political duties? If she belongs to the well-to-do 
class and hires others to do her domestic work, she 
has time for whatever interests her most — only let 
her interests be noble! If she does her own house- 
work, she can take ten minutes to stop on her way to 
market for voting once or twice a year. She can find 
half an hour a day for newspapers and other means 
of information. She can talk with her family and 
friends about what she reads. This she does now; 
she will then do it more intelligently and will give 
and receive more from what she says and hears. 

The duties of motherhood and the making of a 
home are the most sacred work for women of every 
class, and the dearest to them. If casting an intelli- 
gent vote would interfere with what woman alone 
can do — and what, if failed in, undermines society 
and government — no one can question which a 
woman should choose. But it cannot be shown that 
there is any large number of women in this country 


Q72 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


who have not the necessary time to vote intelligently. 
Study of the vital questions of our government would 
make them better comrades to their husbands and 
friends, better guides to their sons, and more inter- 
esting and valuable members of society. Women 
have more leisure than men; they are less tied to 
hours of routine; they usually have more years of 
school training, and in this country their conscience 
and loyalty compare favorably with men’s. All this 
makes simple the combination of public and “ higher” 
duties. 

The objections to the political woman and to the 
educated woman present some instructive analogies. 
Fifty years ago it was seriously believed that knowing 
the classics would ruin a girl’s morals, knowing 
philosophy her religion, and mathematics her health; 
in general, a college education would take away her 
desire to be a good wife and mother. To protect a 
being so frail the colleges were carefully closed against 
her. Now, with the approval of wise men, more girls 
than boys are preparing for college, and this in the 
public interest. It may be found in politics, as in 
education, that the higher duties of women will be 
assisted, not hindered, by intelligent discipline in 
the lower. 


The report on the Endowment of Fellowships is 
admirably drawn. Whether the decision is for 


CAMBRIDGE Q73 


European or American advanced study, I shall sup- 
port it as far as I am able, and I believe the necessary 
money can easily be obtained. Yet I hope the Asso- 
ciation will decide on European study. Our com- 
mittee keeps us properly protected against every 
danger to our students except the family; but that is 
serious. A young woman cannot hold herself apart 
from a needy family, as a young man can. And while 
many a young woman can get advantages in certain 
lines of study pursued in America as well as abroad, 
still on the whole and in the present development of 
women’s scholarship, I believe the Association will 
accomplish more and be more secure of its results 
if it sends its Fellow abroad into an entirely new field. 
There a sick brother cannot claim her for a month’s 
nursing, nor a lonely mother be likely to demand to 
be amused. No! Foreign life has not made me 
exactly inhuman, but we need to strengthen women 
to devote themselves to high, persistent work; and 
there is too little proper sentiment in America about 
the sacredness of their time, as we all know. 


In this distant city the women’s Civic Club has 
good material but bad leadership. ‘The meeting last 
night was in the Presbyterian Church, and more 
than a dozen former Wellesley girls were present. 
There were four addresses before mine; so I spoke 
about twenty minutes, and am afraid I was too 


QT4 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


critical to suit the mass of the audience. In fact I 
was burning with indignation over the president, 
Mrs. T. She is a ranting sentimentalist, a Method- 
ist of the worst type. I cannot understand how this 
woman has done what she really has done. A descrip- 
tion of her talk cannot be put on paper. But more 
hopeless conceit and vulgarity, more cheap senti- 
mentality I have never known packed into a single 
hour. At the close of my address she threw her arms 
around me, called me “my darling,” and begged me 
to bring my trunk at once to her house. Many in the 
audience wiped their eyes with delight at her way 
of saying “ Jesus,” and looked disgusted at my lack 
of “spirituality.” These women will have to learn 
that sprinkling rose-water does not cure the cancers 
of city life. But don’t suppose I said anything so 
heretical here. 


Last week I was fortunate enough to have a talk 
with a Cape Cod farmer at a little railroad station 
where our train was delayed. As we grew confidential 
he told me how, though he was not yet sixty years old, 
he had seen all the dreams of his boyhood come 
true. This surprised me into asking him to be more 
confidential still and to tell me what they were. He 
did so in detail. There was the mortgage on the farm 
when he was a boy, and the heavy load when he 
inherited the farm. He said, “I should have been 


CAMBRIDGE Q75 


swamped by it if I had n’t had the luck just then to 
fall in love with the nicest girl on the Cape. And I 
don’t mind telling you,” he went on, “ what I told her. 
‘I told her that if she would join me I would work 
hard, and we would scrimp and save and pay off that 
mortgage. I told her too that before I got into my 
grave I would earn enough and lay by enough so that 
every one of my women-folks should sit in a rocking- 
chair reading a story every afternoon of their lives.” 
I thanked my farmer then, and I bless him still. His 
story is an American classic. It tells the dream of all 
the chivalrous husbands and fathers and brothers 
and sons of our American women —a glorious 
dream, if the women refuse the rocking-chair and the 
story; but a pitiful one if they take these every after- 
noon of their lives. Never in all the world has so 
much leisure, so much money, or so much freedom 
in the spending of both, been granted women as to 
us to-day. But how slenderly we are fitted for using 
that money and leisure nobly! 


This morning I am asked to write something about 
Miss A. and send it by the next mail to the Magazine. 
How difficult it is to fit such things to the intricate 
reality, and so how untruthful they generally are! 
When I suddenly leave you all, I hope nobody will 
have to say anything about me, or plan a “ Memorial 
Number.” Love and silence are best. 


276 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


You will find some hardship in this change, but 
don’t take it harder than you need. Comfort your- 
self, as I often do, with the thought that rest comes 
sure and soon. Neither you nor I are any longer 
young, and we both come of a short-lived race. After 
all, it makes little difference what happens, or when. 


XU 


BOXFORD 


Axsovut twenty-five miles to the north of Boston, 
and half a dozen inland from the sea, lies the ancient 
village of Boxford, settled among its trees. These 
hem the sight on every side. Wherever you go in 
this rolling country, you seldom leave the woods; 
and even in crossing its two considerable plains, 
jagged peaks of pines form always the sawlike sky- 
line. Encircled by these woods lie many ponds, and 
the streams which run to and fro are met with bewil- 
dering frequency. On them is an occasional saw- 
mill, where piles of sawdust perfume the air. So 
important are our streams that we carefully distin- 
guish their varieties. West of New York everything 
that runs is a “creek.” Brook, as a spoken word, is 
gone —the most regrettable loss the English language 
has suffered in America. With us a creek does not 
run, but is a crack or inlet of the sea. Our largest 
current is ‘Topsfield River; in the second grade of 
things that flow we put our many brooks; and that 
which runs swiftly a part of the year, and shows a 
dry bed for the remainder we fittingly call a run. I 
do not know if the word occurs elsewhere between us 
and Bull Run. 


278 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


In speaking of Boxford it is more natural to tell 
first of its woods, ponds, and brooks than of its 
houses and people, because there are so many more 
of them. The town is nine miles long by five wide, 
but there are more half miles without a house than 
with one. The village itself contains only a dozen, 
beside the single church, the single store, the small 
public library, and the large town hall. Driving 
along the stone-walled roads, one comes at intervals 
on solitary farmsteads where a venerable house and 
large barn sit in smooth fields, sharply sundered from 
the forest. The older houses sit square to the com- 
pass, regardless of the road. Everything about them 
is in order, as was ordained two hundred years ago; 
paint, thrift, and self-respect having maintained the 
standard since. The soil is thin, and the returns 
from farming meagre. Formerly summer crops of 
hay, oats, and wheat were profitable; and in the 
little shoe-shops, which still stand deserted beside 
many houses, the farmer and his children kept busy 
through the winter. But Boxford has been unable to 
hold its own against the farming of the West or the 
machinery of Lynn and Brockton. The young men 
-—— and of later years, since more avenues of employ- 
ment have been opened, the young women too — 
leave the town as soon as possible. Our population, 
less than it was a century ago, barely reaches five 
bundred. Almost entirely it is of English stock, the 


BOXFORD — 279 


same families continuing on their lands through 
many generations. Hardly any Italians, Canadians, 
or Irish are here. There are no poor, no rich; nor 
have we any doctor or lawyer. There are too few 
people to quarrel; and in our wholesome piney air 
dying and falling sick went out of fashion ages ago. 

This is the village which in Mrs. Palmer’s affec- 
tions possessed a sacredness no other spot of earth 
could claim. Into it had soaked the traditions of my 
family for eight generations. To it her own early 
nature-worship had been transferred and here be- 
came newly enriched by many hallowed experiences. 
Here was her refuge when elsewhere the world was 
too much with her. The hush and peace of Boxford 
she has herself expressed in compact verse : — 


Out of the roar and din, 
Safely shut in, 

Out of the seething street, 
Silence to meet. 


Out of the hurrying hours, 
To lie in flowers; 

Far from the toil and strife 
To find our life. 


Ah, let the world forget! 
Here we have met. 

Most in this sacred place 
I see thy face. 


280 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Our farm in Boxford has never been owned by 
anybody but ourselves and the Indians. Captain 
John Peabody built his house here in 1660, and out 
of it came that tribe of Peabodys who have since 
wandered into every state of the Union and even 
made their name blest in far-away London. Until 
1856 the farm continued in that single name. Then 
by the death of my grandfather it descended to my 
mother, Lucy Peabody, and has for the last fifty years 
been known as the Palmer farm. Of its hundred and 
twenty-five acres about half is woodland. Its large 
two-chimneyed house stands in an open field or park 
of twenty acres, dotted with trees which mark the 
line of the run and enclose a small sheet of water. 
Oaks and maples fill the rocky pasture in the rear; 
while across the road, and at about an equal distance 
in front, the sandier soil is covered with pines. Per- 
haps the feature of this bit of ground which was most 
loved by Mrs. Palmer is the twenty-foot brook, which, 
after sauntering through the tall pines, zigzags 
through meadows and yields us, in addition to its 
beauty and murmur, the more solid delights of 
pickerel, lilies, stepping-stones, and bathing-pool. 

In the woods for about two miles run paths, oi 
avenues rather, cut in large part by Mrs. Palmer 
and myself, each enriched by special associations and 
suitably endowed by her with names. Names too 
have gathered about other prominent features of the 


BOXFORD 281 


farm. The Fairy Ring is an open circle in the woods; 
the Old Cellar, a hollow ringed with cedars, still 
shows the foundations of a house which was already 
gone in 1800; at Sunset. Rock on Sunday afternoons 
nearly all Shakespeare’s plays have been read aloud; 
and Hattie’s House, a rock among the ash trees, 
where one may recline, was the favorite haunt of an 
invalid member of the household, long since dead. 
No part of this farm is mere earth and vegetation. 
Clustering associations cover the soil. All entered 
long ago into that alliance with man which in Lord 
Bacon’s judgment is ever a condition of beauty, — 
homo.additus naturae. Raw nature is pretty poor stuff. 
Most philosophers doubt if, parted from man, matter 
would be quite conceivable. Coleridge thought that 
in beholding the world — 


We receive but what we give, 
And in our life alone does nature live. 


At any rate, human emotions intertwined with na- 
ture ennoble both material objects and themselves. 
Things loved cease to be mere things, and retain 
longer than rose-jars a delicate perfume. So did the 
glorifying magic of affection permeate Boxford. 
Mrs. Palmer found the place deeply impregnated 
by the eventful past. When she died, she had given 
it the impress of her pervasive personality. 

Her home was not the old house of the first settler. 


282 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 
This fell into decay in my childhood. Nor was it 


even the stately second house, built on the original 
farm in 1825 by my grandfather. During Mrs. 
Palmer’s life this was occupied by my sister and half 
a dozen others who might by an affectionate arithme- 
tic be counted members of the family. Her home 
was on an adjoining lot, a stone’s throw distant but 
unparted by boundaries. It is a smail, picturesque 
structure, with central chimney, and is almost hidden 
by foliage. It sits on its little bank like a turtle on a 
log. Half a century ago it came into my family, but 
was then already a hundred and fifty years old. In 
its low rooms, each having a big fire-place, one easily 
touches the ceilings with the hand. Across the ceiling 
of the large living room runs the supporting oak 
beam. The chamber above is wainscoted with pine 
which time has deepened almost to mahogany. 
Shutters of the same wood slide across its windows. 

But the outside of this house is more important 
than the inside, though between the two there is 
little distinction; for the floor is on a level with the 
ground, and long diamond windows give exit on all 
sides, while porch and large bay-window bind it still 
more closely to the earth. East and west are piazzas, 
so sheltered with shrubbery as to increase the nest- 
like aspect, the western being fitted as an outdoor 
study and shielded from every storm. Tables and 
chairs and bookshelves and sofa are on it, and in the 


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BOXFORD 283 


rear it connects with a library of fifteen hundred 
volumes. On it we live and work. When people talk 
of the necessity of exercise they chiefly mean the 
necessity of breathing open air. In such an outdoor 
workshop as I have described it is easy to give half a 
dozen hours a day to books and writing; then with a 
couple of hours in the woods toward evening, and 
a bath in the brook on the way home, one comes out 
at the end of the summer in vigorous health. 

Such was Mrs. Palmer’s happy hiding-place. No 
telegraph connects it with the city, the station is a 
mile from the village, our house half a mile from this, 
the railroad a branch line, and there is no hotel. 
Here she was fairly secure from invasion. ‘There were 
no calls to make, no lectures to give, no committees 
to meet, and little company was invited. Occasionally 
the daughter of a friend was with us, and of the con- 
genial company in the ancestral house we saw as little 
or as much as we liked. “Winters for other people,” 
we used to say, “summers for ourselves.” It took 
some time, however, to break up brazen habits of 
incessant work; and in the early years Mrs. Palmer 
was often doubtful about duty. “Do you think we 
have a right to such happiness?” she would ask. 
But soon discovering how she accumulated here 
the stock of energy, learning, and romance from 
which the world drew so copiously during the busy 
season, she reconciled herself to her bliss and ac- 


284: ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


cepted the peace and companionship in which her 
soul delighted. People who found her lamp a light 
to their feet on city streets did not know the Box- 
ford fields in which its oil was grown. But there is 
no feature of joy more creditable than its inevitably 
communicative character. He who is filled with 
happiness, though seemingly absorbed, emanates 
pleasure on whoever crosses his way. He cannot 
contain it all, but produces much for his neighbors. 
There is no other such agent for diffusing joy as the 
heart that itself enjoys. ‘This Mrs. Palmer possessed 
by nature. In Boxford the springs of her effluent 
gladness were newly filled. 

Long before our marriage her restful associations 
with Boxford began. Early in our acquaintance, 
and twice afterwards, she visited me here in com- 
pany with a friend. The summer of 1887, after our 
engagement was announced, she spent in my old 
house with her sister, while I lived with our farmer. 
Here we came for the fortnight after our wedding, 
when the pine boughs were loaded with snow and 
the world without and within was like fairyland. 
Here in subsequent years we often returned to cele- 
brate that anniversary, or — more beautiful still — 
for the early spring recess. Scattered up and down 
the working time many Sundays found us here, 
apple-blossom Sunday never failing. Though May 
and June were too hurried a season to be passed 


BOXFORD 285 


here in full, we usually contrived a few days then for 
observing nature’s miracles. And never does nature 
appear more miraculous than to the tired eyes of the 
dweller in cities when, after absence, he once more 
rests them on green fields stretched out against dark 
trees. I suspect Milton had for a while been a 
stranger at Horton when he wrote “L’Allegro.” 
Among Mrs. Palmer’s papers I find a kindred out- 
burst of astonished country joy: — 


We journeyed through sweet woodland ways, 
My Love and I. 

The maples set the shining fields ablaze. 
The blue May sky 

Brought to us its great Spring surprise; 

While we saw all things through each other’s eyes. 


And sometimes from a steep hillside 
Shone fair and bright 
The shadbush, like a young June bride, 
Fresh clothed in white. 
Sometimes came glimpses glad of the blue sea; 
But I smiled only on my Love. He smiled on me, 


The violets made a field one mass of blue, 
Even bluer than the sky; 

The little brook took on that color too, 
And sang more merrily. 


286 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


“Your dress is blue,” he laughing said. “ Your eyes,” 
My heart sang, “sweeter than the bending skies.” 


We spoke of poets dead so long ago, 
And their wise words. 
We glanced at apple trees, like drifted snow; 
We watched the nesting birds, — 
Only a moment! Ah, how short the day! 
Yet all the winters cannot blow its sweetness quite 
away. 


What were Mrs. Palmer’s occupations in this 
idyllic spot? Letters largely; for even when all other 
human ties are cut, these tentacles search out the 
runaway and seize him where he hides. But two 
hours generally sufficed to clear Mrs. Palmer’s day 
of their clutches. Then birds and books, cooking 
and sewing were at hand. Having a pretty exten- 
sive knowledge of birds, which I with my short sight 
was denied, she tried to spend a little time each day 
sitting about the fields, in attendance on her wayward 
friends. When she was working in the house and I 
on the piazza, I was charged to catch each novel 
sound or sight and speak it not too loudly, so that 
she might glide forth with the opera glass. I find 
memoranda of one hundred and forty varieties of 
birds discovered on the farm. She loved them all; 
not the rare ones only, but those which make the 


BOXFORD 287 


ordinary pleasure of the day. Bobolinks, cuckoos, and 
whip-poor-wills abound in spring; wood-thrushes, 
her favorites among all birds, in the summer, 
Vireos and orioles are in pretty constant song. 
Owls laugh and hoot at night. Among the thick 
foliage flash tanagers, jays, blue-birds, yellow-birds. 
Humming-birds come every ten minutes to the tiger | 
lilies by the piazza, and on one of its rafters each 
spring a phoebe builds and brings out her three 
broods. In and out of a hollow tree by our window 
flickers were always moving, and into the nest of a 
song-sparrow we looked as we raised our curtain. 
She loved the clear call of the quail and the drum 
of the partridge. On the whole, she cared more for 
birds than for the abundant and lovely wild flowers. 
They were more alive. Yet most of the flowers she 
knew, and had them always on her tables. It made 
a kind of festival when I brought her the first col- 
umbine, the first wild rose, the first cardinal, or the 
first blue gentian. The boisterous golden-rod and 
the wide variety of opulent asters told her that the 
year had turned, and touched her with a sort of har- 
vest sadness. The pale stalks of the early meadow 
rue pleased her better. But she had a heart fitted 
also for clover and apple blossoms, for buttercups 
and dandelions, and whatever common brightness 
spots the fertile earth. And then there were the 
butterflies, the bees in the linden, the squirrels, 


288 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


the woodchucks, the foxes. The behavior of all these 
pretty creatures of the country engaged her as closely 
as the winter perplexities of girls. 

There was pleasure too in catching at the right 
moment the successive crops of berries and fruits, 
and preserving them or turning them into jellies. 
She acquired some renown for skill in persuading 
jellies to stiffen. Her rows of glasses she contem- 
plated as a miser his money-bags, knowing their 
power of carrying summer sweetness to winter tables. 
Those made elsewhere were thought to lack the full 
Boxford flavor. Other experiments in cookery could 
be tried here, and the Boxford table must always 
have a special delicacy and neatness. If I missed her 
in the library, I was pretty sure to find her in the 
kitchen. But all the housekeeping was kept simple. 
Our home, convenient and beautiful enough, was 
.of the earlier type, plain and with its pleasures rooted 
in elemental things. ‘The modern city establishment, 
incongruously dropped among fields where it never 
grew, yields no such easy conjunction with nature. 

In later years she turned to photography; and as 
soon as a new section of pathway in the woods was 
accomplished, it was transferred to paper and taken 
to Cambridge for her winter desk. She experimented 
with different methods of developing and printing; 
and I must fit up a dark closet with appropriate 
pans, acids, and waters. But in two respects. her 


BOXFORD 289 


education had been defective. The busy years had 
allowed her no practice in music; and though she 
could pick out a strain on the piano, for solid enjoy- 
ment she was dependent on the performance of 
others. For similar reasons she knew no games until 
after she left Wellesley, and summers were too short 
for acquiring many. In two or three, however, she 
became proficient. ‘There was a species of solitaire 
which she liked, though she soon adjusted it so as 
to enable two persons to work together toward a 
common end. She remade casino so that two players 
could waste a half-hour over it without regret. Domi- 
noes was her favorite when three could play. Its 
luck was largely reduced by the division of all pieces 
at the start, by the exclusion of a pool, and the me- 
chanical turning up of the twenty-eighth piece. De- 
vices were found for keeping the hands decently clear 
of doublets, and skill was set free to operate the long 
suits, to reckon what pieces were in an opponent’s 
hand, to get control of an end, or to block the game 
while leaving few spots in the hand of the blockader. 
A domino score was kept through the summer, or 
even from year to year; and on the piazza most days 
after dinner three opponents struggled to shift that 
score in rival directions. In whist she never became 
expert. Too seldom were four present in playtime. 
And chess she did not learn, as too much like winter 
labors. But though she was unfortunately past thirty 


290 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


when she first took up technical games, she founcl 
herself not unprepared. Everything had been a game 
for her. ‘Throughout life she had been watching con- 
trivance and circumstance as they run side by side, 
and had delighted in the contest by which the worse 
is brought into subjection to the better. 

At Boxford too one could sew; and in sewing she 
delighted, as Izaak Walton in fishing. It was a con- 
templative occupation and an excuse for peace, one 
of the superiorities of her sex. As the needle pushed 
its way along the seam, there came leisure for dream- 
ing, remembering, planning. She resorted to it often 
when alone; and as I read aloud, she would hem 
napkins and table-cloths as peacefully as a cat purrs. 
Usually there was mending at hand, and embroidery 
could be taken at a pinch. But the more aggressive 
forms of sewing were the favorites. From time to 
time I would miss her for a day at her desk. She 
had disappeared into untraceable upper regions. 
When she presented herself at night, I must admire 
the old gown reconstructed, or the spring hat which 
had become an autumn one. Over these triumphs 
she rejoiced as I at completing a magazine article. 
But such happy toils were not allowed to invade our 
evenings. These were reserved for books and early 
bed hours. 

Of course books were the commonest employment 
for both of us. I had my urgent studies, and close 


BOXFORD 291 


at hand she hers. In winter time it was impossible 
to amass much scholarly capital. Broken up as we 
were by engagements and lectures, study then could 
merely respond to immediate needs. But in the un- 
interrupted hours of the blessed summer one could 
explore and heap up knowledge. Not that she even 
then undertook severe connected studies; I cer- 
tainly discouraged them. Her summer was for rest. 
And then too she was not a bookish person, but pri- 
marily a woman of affairs who fed herself best by 
direct observation of men and things. Yet from 
books she derived great stimulus and was always 
longing to come at them more closely. Her actual 
dealings with them were peculiar. They were en- 
tirely subordinated to her life and never acquired 
rights of their own. Sometimes she would go a month 
without opening one; then at a moment of unex- 
pected leisure she would seize whatever came to 
hand — story, verse, abstract discussion, it made 
little difference how severe the subject — and in- 
stantly she was absorbed. Nothing could shake 
her attention. Questions went unanswered, and 
even letters neglected. She read with intensity and 
speed. I have rarely known her to take more than 
half a day for any volume, however substantial, and 
afterwards she knew whatever her book contained. 
Naturally during the summer these times of burial 
in a book were more permissible, and she revelled 
in the opportunity. 


292 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Long before we married both she and I were 
devotees of English poetry; of that poetry, I mean, 
in its historic relations and not merely in its single 
authors. She brought from Wellesley a good acquain- 
tance with both the earlier and the later material, 
and increased it through every year we were together. 
The seventeenth-century poets were especially dear, | 
though of course the enormous and _ passionately 
ethical product of the nineteenth was still oftener in 
our hands. I am inclined to think that all profitable 
communion with poetry has in it an element of 
stealth. It cannot be arranged for, like other inter- 
ests; but requiring more of personal response than 
they, can reach its best results only when stolen 
from moments already more or less pledged. I at 
least have formed my deepest intimacies with the 
poets when I have come upon them by way of inter- 
ruption. During the busy winter, whenever Mrs. 
Palmer and I grew tired, work was cast aside and 
we would snatch an evening for the restful singers. 
I would read aloud, while she sewed or gazed at the 
fire. There is no such means for clearing cobwebs 
from a weary brain as sweeping it with disinfectant 
rhythms. Better than music it is for me because, 
while it is no less sportive than music, its play is 
ever with rationalities. By such interruptions, then, 
we kept ourselves in the best condition both for 
poetry and daily work. 


BOXFORD 293 


Now Boxford was one long interruption, con- 
trived for play, beauty, and idealism. Out of that 
soil poetry grew as naturally as grass in the field. 
It was read because it was lived. As we roamed the 
woods we talked it, discussing the methods and 
psychology of the writers we had been reading. A 
book of verses was often with us underneath the 
bough. And when the nights were fair we would 
carry a shaded light into the pines, and gathering a 
considerable company from the two houses, all as 
mad as we, would lie on the fragrant needles and 
read an evening through. I remember one August 
night having the entire “Midsummer Night’s 
Dream”’ in the Fairy Ring, when owls became our 
chorus, and the moon sifted through the branches 
as if it were Bottom’s lantern. Naturally then when, 
moved by her own experience of a kind of Golden 
Age, she began, as I have related in my first chapter, 
to write verse herself, her lines on love, nature, and 
God — themes never parted in her mind — had an 
easy depth and veracity seldom met in the tangled 
and groping poetry of our time. A few examples of 
her country verse I print. 

It is pleasant to write this lyric chapter on her 
Boxford home, because previously I have so often 
been obliged to exhibit her under harsh conditions. 
She had always a heart most easily made glad, but 
her stern early years gave slender opportunity for’ 


294 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


indulging its capacity for delight. In Boxford this 
was legitimately let loose. Needing little outward 
stimulus because of inward peace, it fastened on the 
small occasions of the country and drew from them 
gaiety and health. Here we went out with joy and 
were led forth with peace. Mountains and hills broke 
forth before us into singing, and all the trees of the 
fields clapped their hands. Not that troubles did not 
sometimes overleap our hedges; we had our share. 
Death did not pass us by, nor illness either. Our 
projects did not always succeed. In a few instances, 
saddest of all, the characters of those we loved col- 
lapsed. But guarded as we were by each other, such 
things did not crush or appall. What would terrify 
another usually left Mrs. Palmer undisturbed. One 
day as she lay ill, a thunder storm came swiftly out 
of the southwest and struck the house, destroying 
the room adjoining her own. She seemed at the time 
much interested in the novel event, as if it were some- 
thing contrived for her entertainment. Only after 
her death I found among her papers a hymn with 
that date attached. It was sung at the Memorial 
Service held in Harvard College Chapel. I print it 
here under the title of “The Tempest.” 


LETTERS 


We are finding Boxford the same restful spot as 
always, only at this Easter season more peaceful 


BOXFORD | 295 


still. The refreshment of it fills heart and brain. 
You know how country hours dream themselves 
away. We seem to have been here but a day, and on 
Wednesday must go reluctantly back to Cambridge. 
The skies have been delicious — warm sun, with 
fresh west wind, and melting moonlight among the 
pines at night. The fields are greening, and our one 
day of gentle constant rain is bringing the wild 
flowers through the dead leaves. There are none in 
actual blossom yet. But the robins are making them- 
selves at home in the fields and apple trees, and the 
swallows and bluebirds are important over spring 
house-hunting and settling. I know how they feel. 


It is a glowing spring morning. The transforma. 
tion of the world is wonderful. Everything you see 
is a surprise. The fields have that vivid green which 
is so brief. The crops stand in shining rows two 
inches high. ‘The streams are full of sparkling 
water, the maples flaming red, willows in their 
spring glory, and all the light woods a-flutter with 
young leaves. They plainly hint of bloodroot and 
hepatica. Everywhere spring work goes on: plowing 
in some places, sowing and planting in others, gar- 
dening and housecleaning wherever people live. 
Yesterday we went through the wood paths, clearing 
away the winter’s droppings. That’s what we came 
for — the silence of the pine woods. Such infinite 


296 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


stillness gives me a kind of awe. And to-morrow we 
must be at our desks in Cambridge! 


Our servant is enchanted with Boxford, begging 
me to remain here all the year, wishing the old house 
were in Cambridge, “if we must live there.’’ This 
delights me and assures a peaceful kitchen for the 
summer. She has been helping me plant seeds about 
the windows — morning-glories, sweet peas, pansies, 
nasturtiums. We have upholstered several chairs 
and painted others, setting our house in order. 
G. is wonderfully well. He is working on his Homer, 
which comes out this summer and keeps him steadily 
busy. 


So this is blessed Boxford again! We saw it at five 
o'clock to-day, and are already adjusting ourselves 
to it with expansive satisfaction. Did we ever find it 
so green and sweet before? The haying is just 
begun, and the fields are superb, with the grass up 
to my waist, all full of clover and daisies and butter- 
cups. Wild roses are in blossom by the Run. The 
pheebe is raising her second brood on the piazza, 
and in the old apple trees the young robins and 
bluebirds are learning to fly. You should be here 
to help me see their awkward ways. As I write in 
the library a whip-poor-will comes into the ash tree 
and sings as if he were in the room itself, an owl] 


BOXFORD 297 


calls far away in the pines, and the moonlight on 
the Park turns it into fairy land. 


We were amazed at the coolness and freshness of 
this refuge yesterday, when after the fierce heat of 
Cambridge we again found ourselves under our 
vines. It is a delicious world, the second “sea-turn ” 
within a week softening and refreshing all. I wish I 
could send some of it to you, send too some of my 
easy housekeeping. In this respect Boxford improves. 
This year we have more provision-wagons coming 
to our door. Twice a week a man brings us fish 
straight from the sea. Ask H. if she will have steamed 
Duxbury clams or a broiled live lobster for lunch. 
I wish you might see how attractive the old rooms 
look with their new curtains, green and white, and 
the new coverings for the lounges and window seats. 
And then we have time here, we two. Last night by 
lamplight we sat late on the piazza, while G. read 
aloud a French novel. And there he sits now, sway- 
ing back and forth as he reads or watches the hay- 
makers in the Park, or pats the dog at his feet, who 
hardly turns his head from gazing far away at the 
woodchucks in the field. It does my heart good to 
be in such scenes. Here is quiet for tired nerves 
that makes one able to meet anything smilingly 
afterwards. 


298 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


We shall expect you on Saturday afternoon. 
Dear me! I wish the house were not so little. Two 
rooms are hardly large enough for seven Wellesley 
girls. But my heart is large enough, and I want them 
all for Sunday. That will give time for at least seven 
good talks. And what a glorious set of girls it is, as 
you name them over, every one of them! This week 
the cook has been on a vacation, though she will be 
here when you arrive. But you should have tasted 
the nice things I have cooked. G. says my bread is 
the very best he has ever eaten, and my currant jelly 
and preserves are beautiful to behold. How you will 
enjoy the fragrant haying and the cardinal flowers 
in the Run! 


THE TEMPEST 


He shall give His angels charge 
Over thee in all thy ways. 
Though the thunders roam at large, 
Though the lightning round me plays, 
Like a child I lay my head 
In sweet sleep upon my bed. 


Though the terror come so close, 
It shall have no power to smite; 
It shall deepen my repose, 
Turn the darkness into light. 


BOXFORD 299 


Touch of angels’ hands is sweet; 
Not a stone shall hurt my feet. 


All Thy waves and billows go 
Over me to press me down 
Into arms so strong I know 
They will never let me drown. 
Ah, my God, how good Thy will! 
I will nestle and be still. 


HALLOWED PLACES 


I pass my days among the quiet places 
Made sacred by your feet. 

The air is cool in the fresh woodland spaces, 
The meadows very sweet. 


The sunset fills the wide sky with its splendor, 
The glad birds greet the night. 

I stop and listen for a voice strong, tender, 
I wait those dear eyes’ light. 


You are the heart of every gleam of glory, 
Your presence fills the air; 

About you gathers all the fair year’s story, 
I read you everywhere. 


300 


ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


BEFORE THE MOWING 


Never a sunny morning 
Fuller of bliss. 

Never gladder faces 

Felt the sun’s warm kiss 
Than my meadow blossoms, 
Dreaming not of this, 


Wild roses beckoned 

All along the Run; 

Hardhack and meadow rue 

Sang, “The night is done!” 

All the grasses waved their hands 
And welcomed back the sun. 


Daisies and clovers 

Nestled side by side; 

Buttercups and black-eyed Susans 
Tossed their heads in pride; 

And a tall field lily 

Looked at me and sighed. 


Ah, my meadow grasses, 

How your breath is sweet! 
How you shelter happy homes 
Safe around your feet! 

How you shine, relentless death 
Suddenly to meet! 


BOXFORD 301 


SUMMER RAIN 


Stand with me here, 
My very dear! 

Watch the swift armies of the summer rain 
Sweep the tall grasses of the Park, 
Changing our shining noonday into dark. 

Hear the loud thunder roar, again, again, 

And roll and triumph in this summer rain, 


The little birds all hide; 
The cattle, wandering wide, 
Seek the safe shelter of a spreading tree; 
The old dog crouches by his master’s feet. 
Dark clouds come on, an army, strong and fleet. 
Crash follows crash, all things to covert flee; 
And wind and lightning drive me, — close to thee! 


THE BUTTERFLY 


I hold you at last in my hand, 
Exquisite child of the air. 
Can I ever understand 
How you grew to be so fair? 


You came to my linden tree 
To taste its delicious sweet, 


802 


ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I sitting here in the shadow and shine 
Playing around its feet. 


Now I hold you fast in my hand, 
You marvelous butterfly, 

Till you help me to understand 
The eternal mystery. 


From that creeping thing in the dust 
To this shining bliss in the blue! 
God give me courage to trust 
I can break my chrysalis too! 


NIGHTFALL 


The dear, long, quiet summer day 
Draws to its close. 

To the deep woods I steal away 

To hear what the sweet thrush will say 
In her repose. 


Beside the brook the meadow rue 
Stands tall and white. 

The water softly slips along, 

A murmur to the thrush’s song 
‘To greet the night. 


BOXFORD 303 


Over and over, like a bell, 

Her song rings clear; 
The trees stand still in joy and prayer. 
Only the angels stir the air, 

Kiigh Heaven bends near. 


I bow my head and lift my heart 
In thy great peace. 

Thy Angelus, my God, I heed. 

By the still waters wilt thou lead 
Till days shall cease. 


ON A GLOOMY EASTER 


I hear the robins singing in the rain. 

The longed-for Spring is hushed so drearily 
That hungry lips cry often wearily, 

“Oh, if the blessed sun would shine again!” 


I hear the robins singing in the rain. 
The misty world lies waiting for the dawn, 
The wind sobs at my window and is gone, 
And in the silence come old throbs of pain. 


But still the robins sing on in the rain; 

Not waiting for the morning sun to break, 
Nor listening for the violets to wake, 

Nor fearing lest the snow may fall again. 


304 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


My heart sings with the robins in the rain; 
For I remember it is Easter morn, 

And life and love and peace are all newborn, 
And joy has triumphed over loss and pain. 


Sing on, brave robins, sing on in the rain! 
You know behind the clouds the sun must shine; 
You know that death means only life divine, 
And all our losses turn to heavenly gain. 


I lie and listen to you in the rain. 
Better than Easter bells that do not cease, 

Your message from the heart of God’s great peace. 
And to his arms I turn and sleep again. 


DECEMBER 


Only half a year ago, Love, 
Did we pass this way? 

Now the ground is white with snowdrifts, 
Chill the clouds and gray. 


Then the river wandered softly 
Onward to the sea; 

All the glad world sang in chorus 
Just for you and me. 


BOXFORD 305 


Full of light and sound and fragrance, 
Night shone more than day; 

Till we held our breath in rapture, 
And in silence lay. 


Now the earth is cold and lifeless, 
All the trees are bare; 

Only now and then a snowflake 
Wanders through the air. 


But your hand sweeps all my heartstrings 
To a joyful tune; 

In the world it may be winter, 
In my life *tis June. 


So in meeting or in parting, 
Winter time or Spring, 

You still fill my life with beauty, 
Teach my days to sing. 


A COMMUNION HYMN 


How sweet and silent is the place, 
My God, alone with thee! 

Awaiting here thy touch of grace, 
Thy heavenly mystery. 


306 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


So many ways thou hast, dear Lord, 
My longing heart to fill: 

Thy lovely world, thy spoken word, 
The doing thy sweet will, 


Giving thy children living bread, 
Leading thy weak ones on, 

The touch of dear hands on my head, 
The thought of loved ones gone. 


Lead me by many paths, dear Lord, 
But always in thy way; 

And let me make my earth a Heaven 
Till next Communion Day. 


While I was in Boston [writes Gertrude W. 
Fielder] I had the pleasure of meeting Alice Freeman 
Palmer. She was a doer of the word, and not a 
hearer only; for almost every week through the hot 
summer she used to leave her peaceful, calm retreat 
in the country and go to Boston to talk to children 
of the slums at a vacation school. These schools 
are kept up through the summer in the poorest 
localities. ‘The children are given a morning’s 
session of music, reading, and pretty water-color 
sketches, to look at. They can bring the babies 
with them; and many indeed could not come at 


BOXFORD 307 


all without the little ones. Here is the story as Mrs. 
Palmer told it: — 


One July morning I took an early train. It was a 
day that gave promise of being very, very hot even 
in the country, and what in the city! When I reached 
my destination I found a great many girls in the 
room, but more babies than girls, it seemed. Each 
girl was holding one, and there were a few to spare. 
“Now,” I said, “what shall I talk to you about this 
morning, girls?” “Talk about life,” said one girl. 
Imagine! “I am afraid that is too big a subject 
for such a short time,” I said. 

Then up spoke a small, pale-faced, heavy-eyed 
child, with a great fat baby on her knee, “Tell us 
how to be happy.” The tears rushed to my eyes, 
and a lump came in my throat. Happy in such sur- 
roundings as those in which, no doubt, she lived: 
perhaps dirty and foul-smelling! Happy, with 
burdens too heavy to be borne! All this flashed 
through my mind while the rest took up the word 
and echoed, “Yes, tell us how to be happy.” 

“Well,” I said, “I will give you my three rules 
for being happy; but mind, you must all promise 
to keep them for a week, and not skip a single day, 
for they won’t work if you skip one single day.’”’ So 
they all faithfully and solemnly promised that they 
would n’t skip a single day. 


308 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


“The first rule is that you will commit something 
to memory every day, something good. It need n’t 
be much, three or four words will do, just a pretty 
bit of a poem, or a Bible verse. Do you under- 
stand?” I was so afraid they would n’t, but one 
little girl with flashing black eyes jumped up from 
the corner of the room and cried, “I know; you 
want us to learn something we’d be glad enough to 
remember if we went blind.” “'That’s it, exactly!” 
{ said. “Something you would like to remember if 
you went blind.” And they all promised that they 
would, and not skip a single day. 

“The second rule is: Look for something pretty 
every day; and don’t skip a day, or it won’t work. 
A leaf, a flower, a cloud — you can all find some- 
thing. Is n’t there a park somewhere near here that 
you can all walk to?” (Yes, there was one.) “And 
stop long enough before the pretty thing that you 
have spied to say, ‘Isn’t it beautiful!’ Drink in 
every detail, and see the loveliness all through. Can 
you do it?” They promised, to a girl. 

“My third rule is — now, mind, don’t skip a day 
— Do something for somebody every day.” “Oh, 
that’s easy!” they said, though I thought it would 
be the hardest thing of all. Just think, that is what 
those children said, “Oh, that’s easy! Did n’t they 
have to tend babies and run errands every day, 
and was n’t that doing something for somebody?” 
“Yes,” I answered them, “it was.” 


BOXFORD 309 


At the end of the week, the day being hotter than 
the last, if possible, I was wending my way along a 
very narrow street, when suddenly I was literally 
grabbed by the arm, and a little voice said, “I done 
it!” “Did what!” I exclaimed, looking down, and 
seeing at my side a tiny girl with the proverbial fat 
baby asleep in her arms. Now I will admit that it 
was awfully stupid of me not to know, but my 
thoughts were far away, and I actually did not know 
what she was talking about. “What you told us to, 
and [ never skipped a day, neither,” replied the child, 
in a rather hurt tone. “Oh,” I said, ‘now I know 
what you mean. Put down the baby, and let’s talk 
about it.” So down on the sidewalk she deposited 
the sleeping infant, and she and I stood over it and 
talked. 

“Well,” she said, “I never skipped a day, but it 
was awful hard. It was all right when I could go to 
the park, but one day it rained and rained, and the 
baby had a cold, and I just could n’t go out, and I 
thought sure I was going to skip, and I was standin’ 
at the window, ’most cryin’, and I saw ”’ — here her 
little face brightened up with a radiant smile — “I 
saw a sparrow takin’ a bath in the gutter that goes 
round the top of the house, and he had on a black 
necktie, and he was handsome.”’ It was the first time 
I had heard an English sparrow called handsome, but 
I tell you it was n’t laughable a bit — no, not a bit. 


310 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


“ And then, there was another day,” she went on, 
“and I thought I should have to skip it, sure. There 
was n’t another thing to look at in the house. The 
vaby was sick, and I could n’t go out, and I was 
feelin’ terrible, when” — here she caught me by both 
hands, and the most radiant look came to her face — 
“TI saw the baby’s hair!” “Saw the baby’s hair!” 
I echoed. “ Yes, a little bit of sun came in the win- 
dow, and I saw his hair, an’ I'll never be lonesome 
any more.” And catching up the baby from the 
sidewalk, she said, “See!” and I too saw the baby’s 
hair. “Isn’t it beau-ti-ful?” she asked. “Yes, it 
is beautiful,” I answered. You have heard of artists 
raving over ‘Titian hair. Well, as the sun played on 
this baby’s hair, there were the browns, the reds, the 
golds, which make up the Titian hair. Yes, it was 
truly beautiful. “Now, shall we go on?” I said, 
taking the heavy baby from her. 

The room was literally packed this time; ten times 
as many girls, and as many babies as your mind will 
conceive of. I wish you could have listened with me 
to the experiences of those little ones. Laughter and 
tears were so commingled that I don’t know which 
had the mastery. 


XIV 


DEATH 


“We make too much of the circumstance men call 
death. All life is one. All service one, be it here or 
there. Death is only a little door from one room to 
another. We had better not think much about it, 
nor be afraid for ourselves or for those who are dear 
to us; but rather make life here so rich and sweet and 
noble that this will be our Heaven. We need no other 
till He comes and calls us to larger life and fresh 
opportunity.” 

So spoke Mrs. Palmer at the funeral of a friend, 
and such was always her habit,—to make little 
account of death. In accordance with her wise words 
I should naturally record here only the bare fact that 
she died in Paris on December 6, 1902. Her life was 
so beautiful and triumphant, so naturally imparting 
strength to others, and in its ending so happily sud- 
den, that it would be almost an insult to her mem- 
ory to recall dolorous circumstances connected with 
her departure and associate thoughts of sadness with 
so bright a being. Life, not death, is for all who loved 
her the sigificant reality. To dwell on the facts of 
parting i¢ as inappropriate as to report how she 


312 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


closed her house when she was preparing for a 
sabbatical year in Europe. 

Yet among what may be broadly called the living 
features of death two deserve attention : it no less than 
any other event Is expressive of character, and the 
conditions under which it appears often give grounds 
for condemning or approving previous methods of 
life. ‘To leave either of these points unnoticed, more 
particularly the latter, would render my account of 
Mrs. Palmer imperfect. I shall accordingly use her 
death as the occasion for considering some general 
questions about her: the brevity of her life, her physi- 
cal constitution, the care of her health, and the cost 
of her large accomplishment. 

Mrs. Palmer was an extremely busy woman. The 
amount of work she bore was enormous and the 
diversity of it no less remarkable. Since a large por- 
tion of it was connected with some sort of leadership, 
it brought upon her great responsibility and taxed 
her bodily and mental strength to the utmost. Her 
domestic cares were not less than those of ordinary 
women, nor less exquisitely performed. She did the 
usual amount of housekeeping, sewing, visiting, re- 
ceiving guests, looking after the sick and poor, and at- 
tending social functions. In the occupations counted 
specifically feminine she even excelled. Yet after 
these were all beautifully accomplished there came 
those public duties to which she gave two thirds of 


DEATH 3 313 


her time. In these she carried almost the ordinary 
work of a college official, a minister, and a business 
man combined. And while it is true that until her 
marriage she was free from household cares, this 
advantage was offset by the grinding character of 
the tasks in school and college, and by the unlimited 
demands to which her dutiful nature there exposed 
her. On the whole it may be said that from girlhood 
to the grave, with only brief intervals after marriage, 
her powers were kept under incessant tension. Nat- 
urally then she was often judged harshly. Was not 
her career simply another instance of headlong and 
ill-regulated zeal? Did she not by example encour- 
age repose-needing women to undertake what was 
excessive even for a man? Powers like hers should 
have been treated with respect and guarded. Was 
not her wastefulness sure to result in early collapse ? 
And when her death before the age of fifty startled 
the many who needed her, these doubts were doubled 
and the inquiry was inevitable whether it would not 
have been wiser to continue longer at a slower pace? 
I hope every reader of my book has been asking these 
questions. This is the place to answer them. 

No one would affirm that her life in college or in 
her early teaching was ideal. It contained twice too 
much work and only half enough refreshment. It 
was attended throughout by crushing anxieties. Had 
her health been properly regarded at this time, she 


314 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


might have eradicated some of the physical weak- 
nesses she inherited and so have greatly lightened 
the labors of later vears. That she did not do so, 
however, was not her fault. The exactions of those 
years she did not choose. ‘They were laid upon her 
by poverty. She had an education to gain, a living 
to earn; and she accepted their hard conditions as 
cheerfully as have hundreds of other young men 
and women. I wonder that she passed through them 
with so little physical damage and drew from them 
such refinement and charm. 

Nor do I see any signs of carelessness in the 
Wellesley time. During her teaching there the dis- 
turbed conditions inseparable from the starting of 
a new college overworked all its Faculty, utterly 
breaking down its leaders, — the founder, the presi- 
dent, and herself. She alone showed such sagacity 
in methods of restoration that she was soon able to 
return to work and accept the presidency; her chief 
hesitation in doing so being, as the letters I have 
printed show, the doubt whether she ought to ex- 
pose herself to new exhaustion. Once having de- 
cided that the college was more important than her- 
self, she was obliged to give herself wholly to its 
demands. Yet even then she studied protective mea- 
sures. She kept a horse and took regular exercise; 
she was careful of food and sleep; at times of special 
fatigue she would spend a day or two at a solitary 


DEATH 315 


room in Boston; and as soon as a cottage could be 
built at Wellesley for housing a few girls, she re- 
moved from the great hall and sheltered herself in 
its comparative seclusion. On the whole, there were 
few means of protection available during this glo- 
riously self-sacrificing period which she did not 
employ. 

I speak of these matters somewhat in detail be- 
cause, like most great workers, she attached much 
importance to the physical basis of life and con- 
stantly warned her girls against disregard of the laws 
of health. Yet it should also be said that she ex- 
pected her life to be a short one and was ever so- 
licitous how to effect what she desired within its brief 
compass. We have seen how the uncertainties of 
her college years led her to treat each of them as if 
it were to be her last; and something of the same 
feeling attended her through life, I hardly know why. 
Partly it came from her knowledge of the inherited 
dangers of her constitution; still more, I think, from 
her sense of the urgency of human needs, and such 
a recognition as Jesus had that those who would 
meet them must be ready to be consumed. But this 
was not all. There was besides a sort of presentiment 
which I could never fully explore or remove. It was 
seldom asserted, never argued; only when I would 
attempt to make some provision for her old age, I 
was always met by the quiet words, “ You need n’t. 


316 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I shan’t survive you. My life will be short.” I think 
she was surprised that the end was deferred so 
long. 

Expecting then a brief career, one might suppose 
she would have cleared it of all unnecessary toil and 
so have “saved her strength.” But this popular 
phrase she utterly distrusted, and her life ought to 
do much to make that distrust more general. ‘The 
notion that to each of us is allotted a definite amount 
of vigor, and that expenditure causes diminution of 
the total sum, she regarded as a pernicious mechan- 
ical superstition. It is certainly the common excuse 
for inaction, and more than anything else checks the 
full development of women. Idleness is in reality far 
more dangerous than work. It is in the nature of life 
to grow by exercise and, with proper care, to increase 
through outgo. The blacksmith does not enfeeble 
his arm by pounding; that is his method of enlarg- 
ing its power. She believed continuous work to be 
conducive to health and she proved it so by practice. 
Beginning weak and working steadily, often unable 
to secure proper safeguards against exhaustion, she 
escaped all the ills from which idle women suffer, 
acquired remarkable hardihood, and almost every 
year found herself sturdier than before. If there is 
any one lesson which Mrs. Palmer’s life preéminently 
teaches, it is the life-preserving influence of persistent, 
severe, and judiciously managed labor. | 


DEATH 317 


' T have said that such judicious management was 
not fully possible until her marriage. ‘Throughout 
the third period of her life, as I have divided it, her 
public services were largely of a sacrificial sort and 
were understood to have little reference to her own 
needs. But in her last fifteen years, in what I have 
calied her fourth period, there was no such clash of 
interests. ‘Though never more widely useful, she 
was then heartily enjoying the full exercise of dis- 
eiplined powers. Culpable indeed she must have 
been if during these years she overworked. 

On the whole, I do not think she did. Like every- 
body, she had her times of weariness. The accident 
described in my twelfth chapter brought permanent 
damage. But neither this nor any previous fatigue 
had any influence in shortening her life. She died of a 
rare disease, intus-susception of the intestine, a disease 
against which no precautions are possible. Its causes 
are totally unknown. Many physicians believe it to 
be congenital, and all those consulted agreed that 
nothing which she had done or left undone could in 
any way have hastened it. When the trouble began 
she was in excellent health, and in the intervals of 
its covert advance she was altogether free from dis- 
turbance. Of the many experienced surgeons sum- 
moned for diagnosis not one suspected danger till 
five days before she died, nor after they advised an 
operation did they see much chance of recovery. 


318 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Yet even then so hardy was she that she came 
through one of the severest operations known to 
surgery, lay painless and peaceful for three days, and 
would probably have survived had nature endowed 
her at birth with a full pulse. ‘The circumstances 
of her death give strong confirmation to her gospel 
of work. 

Yet in expounding that gospel I ought to make 
plain how much she excluded from it which ordina- 
rily slips in. She seldom hurried, never worried, ad- 
mitted no regrets for the past or anxieties for the 
future. Drudgery she abhorred, and consequently 
avoided too great single continuity on the one hand, 
and disjointed fragmentariness on the other. From 
these insidious dangers she was saved by habits of 
concentrated attention, by the deep interest she took 
in all she did, by such perception of its human 
bearings that no part of it became mechanical, by 
quick separation of the important and unimportant, 
by perpetual humor, and steady enthusiasm — the 
whole supplemented by a kind of natural vagrancy. 
She dropped work as easily as she took it up, and 
never acquired the fatal inability to stop. It was 
the whole-hearted character of that work which kept 
it sane and safe. Joy is protective. Where soul, 
mind, and strength are all engaged together, invigor- 
ation usually follows. It is the divided nature which 
lacerates; the hands in one place, the heart in 


DEATH 319 


another. Putting herself fully into her work, and 
freeing it from frictions, she made an amount that 
was appalling to others really beneficial. 

But while certain peculiarities of her tempera- 
ment thus prevented injury from work, others ex- 
posed her to it. She was ever easy to be entreated, 
and each new thing appeared with an altogether 
special claim. Every good woman is in danger of 
over-helpfulness. Recognizing this beautiful danger, 
after our marriage I constituted myself her watch- 
dog and barked violently at whatever suspicious per- 
sons I saw approach. It pleases me to think that by 
such hostilities I cut off a quarter of her labors, the 
least important quarter. Though occasionally chafing 
under the restraint, she on the whole saw my use- 
fulness and rewarded me with adequate thanks. 

If then this is a sufficient account of that curious 
diligence which might easily be supposed to have 
induced her comparatively early death, it only 
remains to state briefly the circumstances under 
which her life closed, especially those which most 
reveal her character. 

In 1902, when a Sabbatical Year became due me, 
we were neither of us inclined to use it. Never had 
home seemed so attractive, nor our employments so 
engrossing. But in the past we had derived such 
benefit from these periodic relaxations that, not 
daring to reject this one altogether, we decided to 


320 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


accept the first part of it and to resume work in 
the middle of the year. Even then we lingered at 
Boxford through the summer and did not sail till the 
first of October. Some petty circumstances of our de- 
parture are perhaps characteristic enough to deserve 
mention. 

We were to sail on Wednesday morning. During 
the preceding week I could not induce Mrs. Palmer 
to pack. That was our last week in Boxford, and 
we must enjoy it. When Monday came, we set about 
the business in earnest; but soon she wandered out 
under the peach tree, and came back reporting that 
some of the peaches were ripe, and I must get one 
she had noticed. I did so, and she declared it deli- 
cious. It would be a shame to leave such fruit to 
perish. We might take a little rest from packing and 
put up a few jars for winter. So we sat merrily down 
on the piazza and began peeling peaches. On one 
excuse and another I was sent back to the tree for 
more, till we had disposed of a bushel. Then the full 
absurdity of the situation came over me, and I said, 
“What fools we are! With all this work on hand, to 
sit through a morning peeling peaches! As if we 
could eat a bushel of peaches next year!” “Next 
year?” she answered. “Nonsense! They will be 
good for years to come, and the little packing is 
easily managed.” And so it proved. She provided 
for my table long after she had left it, and time 


DEATH 321 


enough was found during the packing for two other 
considerable events. ‘Tuesday afternoon we spent at 
the wedding of a friend; and Tuesday morning a 
young relative from the great house crossed the 
lawn to say that a young man in Cambridge had just 
written her a letter which promised something simi- 
lar in the future for herself. Mrs. Palmer was all 
sympathy at once. We must have that young man 
here immediately. I must ride to the village and 
telephone orders for him to appear that night. And 
so it happened that our last evening at home was 
given to a rejoicing pair, and the trunks were seem- 
ingly left to pack themselves. But this they did. On 
Wednesday morning they stood quite ready, and 
nothing was afterwards missed from them which 
Europe required. 

Two young friends joined us in Boston: Miss S. 
to be our companion throughout, and Mr. M. for 
the first month only. An important fifth member 
of our party was the old English poet, George 
Herbert, whose works I was then editing and whose 
embroidered phrases were constantly on our lips. 
On landing in England, and after the usual few days 
at the Lakes, we put ourselves under his guidance, 
following him to all the places where he lived from 
birth to death. Many of these places we had visited 
before, but a few literary “finds” now made in them 
gave Mrs. Palmer much pleasure. So did a little 


322 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


stay in Oxford with some old friends. London gave 
her the magnificent pageant of King Edward acknow- 
ledging his recovery from recent illness; gave her, too, 
its National Gallery and the music at St. Paul’s. 
About the first of November, Mr. M. leaving us, 
we crossed to Paris. Here we found our old rooms 
occupied, but were able to establish ourselves close 
at hand in an apartment at 67 Avenue Marceau. 
It is a wide, clean, and sunny street, the only objec- 
tion to this new home being that it was larger and 
more magnificent than was our usual habit. But we 
closed its great reception room, with the mirrors and 
gilded furniture, and gathered about the open fire in 
the library. Here our little Marie served our meals; 
here during most of the mornings and evenings Mrs. 
Palmer sewed, wrote, or listened ; and in the after- 
noons renewed her old pleasure in the Louvre, the 
river, Notre Dame, and the Théatre Francais. 
Sundays were poorer than during earlier visits be- 
cause of the death of the great Protestant preacher, 
Bersier. She counted him inferior only to Phillips 
Brooks. 

But she had the little excursions which she always 
enjoyed. One sunny day we spent at Amiens 
Cathedral; one at St. Denis; and one evening on 
reading the paper she exclaimed, “'To-day is All 
Saints’ Day, and seventy thousand people have been 
at Pere la Chaise. To-morrow there will be as many 


DEATH 323 


more. We must go.” “But why,” I said, “go where 
there is a crowd?” “Why, so as to be with people 
and join them in decorating the graves.” We had 
never visited Pere la Chaise before; but she was 
happy in climbing the flower-lined Rue Roquette, 
in hunting out the monuments of those she knew, 
in watching the funeral observances, so unlike those 
of her own land, and especially in mingling with the 
mourning multitude. As she approached the gate, 
a girl offered her violets. She bought a bunch, saying 
she would carry them to Héloise, whom she admired 
as a great administrator no less than as an ardent 
woman. She found the tomb where the stone Jovers 
lie, and tossed the violets over the railing. That 
night, meditating by the fireside, she remarked, “I 
like cremation better. Not that I would insist on it 
against the wishes of friends. Burial concerns the 
living more than the dead. But I hope I may be 
cremated.’ Such were the instructions I receivea 
only a month before I went with her for the second 
time to Pére la Chaise. 

During much of that month she was not ill, but 
merely ailing. From time to time she was able to go 
about freely, and between the attacks of seeming 
indigestion to be as well as ever. The last occasion 
on which she went out was in response to a request 
for an address at a girls’ school. I am told she was 
never more delightful, though only three weeks later 


324 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


that school sat with me at her funeral. There fol- 
lowed this address a week under the doctor’s charge, 
with apparent cure; another, of fresh outbreak and 
of consultation with three eminent physicians, all 
perplexed ; in another still came the decision to oper- 
ate, the private hospital, the death. During her last 
fortnight she lay most of the time, patient and inter- 
ested, in the library, and had me read her two books 
which had just been sent, President Hyde’s little 
volume, “ Jesus’ Way,” and Quiller-Couch’s ‘ Ox- 
ford Book of Poetry.” She continued to discuss my 
problems in Herbert; and when the Boston papers 
arrived, I must quickly discover the home news and 
report it all. To the last she did not lose that mental 
eagerness. A spasm of pain would overwhelm her, 
leaving her for a moment unconscious; then the eyes 
would unclose and she would say, “'There, that is 
gone; and what did they do on the School Board?” 
She lived fully, so long as she drew breath. 

On Wednesday of the last week the doubtful 
doctors came early, and after consultation ordered 
an operation for that noon; they did not conceal 
from her that it would probably be fatal, for in all the 
necessary examinations she had been the coolest and 
helpfulest of the company. They leaving us at nine, 
we had an hour together before she was removed. 

And then appeared for the last time that strange 
combination of clear intelligence and emotional ardor, 


DEATH 325 


of sweet womanliness and attention to business, 
which ever distinguished her. Her fearless wise talk 
had even its usual humorous turns. As the door 
closed, she bade me fetch a package of papers and 
handed me back a little group. These were her en- 
gagements for the winter. I must write to these 
people and not let them be disappointed. Then there 
were the friends at home, to each of whom some- 
thing was sent; and I must watch over her parents 
and sister. “Bobby will miss me,” she said. He was 
her godson. I must not spend the summer in Box- 
ford. Later ones would be good there, but this year 
I had better carry out an engagement to lecture in 
California. She thought she understood my work. 
I had promised her a little book on ethics. Could I do 
that in a year? And then I must not allow anything 
to intervene till our Herbert was published. That 
would require two years more; and so it did. Beyond 
that, nobody could foresee. But there would be our 
two colleges, our boys and girls — work enough to 
keep me busy, work too which had interested us 
both. She could think of no last words to say; our 
whole lives had spoken those. We knew each other’s 
deep love; and I must treat myself honorably, allow- 
ing no doubts or regrets to come. “Call our faithful 
Marie and give her this dress. And now,” she said, 
“you must go to the hospital and have the room 
ready when the ambulance arrives.” 


826 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


I had some fears about the hospital. Sanitarily 
excellent as it was, and containing the best skill in 
France, its nurses were black-robed nuns with white 
head-bands. Her room was consecrated to John the 
Baptist, and an image of the saint stood by her head. 
Formalism in religion was peculiarly obnoxious to 
her. The simplicity prized everywhere else she 
counted essential in her approaches to God. It 
struck me therefore as bizarre that this widely loved 
American and Protestant should die almost alone 
among Roman Catholics, persons who knew no 
English words and could comprehend still less the 
conditions of mind behind them. But all my fears 
were set at rest the next morning. As I entered, her 
face was all aglow over “this blessed place where the 
air seems full of religion, and one feels entirely free 
and at ease.’ She reminded me of her two previous 
hospital experiences, but neither so satisfactory as 
this. I had to check her eager whisperings and to say 
that we must use whatever strength she had pretty 
skilfully if we would celebrate our wedding-day a 
fortnight hence. With a gay smile she answered that 
_ together we had pulled ourselves through many tight 
places, and we really might cheat the doctors yet 
Of course she endeared herself to doctors and nurses. 
When early on Saturday morning the breath quietly 
stopped, the attending sister broke into sobs. I 

asked, “Est-ce qu’elle est morte?” “Morte, Mon- 


DEATH 327 


sieur!”’ she cried, ‘‘ Mais qu’elle était une femme 
exceptionelle !” 

Would she have had mcre chance for life, or less 
suffering, if the inevitable catastrophe had befallen 
her in America? Certainly one would have selected 
these circumstances for her death as little as he would 
have chosen most of the other severities of that life 
which still all called good. Events must be judged 
in relation to character. Judging so, I think those 
of her ending fortunate. She was attended by the 
highest skill; had every comfort of home, food, and 
care; her admirable servant would have died for her 
at any minute; she held her consciousness to the last, 
making the business of dying as brief as she had 
always hoped it might be; and by her banishment 
was saved from the inquiries, anxieties, and lamenta- 
tions of friends. I cannot imagine a greater distress 
to that tender heart than would have been the suf- 
ferings of others on her account. Only the Sunday 
before she died she reproached me for writing to a 
friend that she was not quite well. But though no 
regrets are proper for the manner of her death, who 
can contemplate the fact of it and not call the world 
irrational if out of deference to a few particles of dis- 
ordered matter it excludes so fair a spirit? 


AV 


CHARACTER 


Ow returning from Europe I was asked to allow 
a service to be held in Cambridge in memory of 
Mrs. Palmer. I gladly did so, and a large company 
of her friends assembled in the chapel of Harvard 
College on January 31, 1903. Every part of the 
service was in charge of those who had known and 
loved her. Few strangers were in the audience. The 
ushers were teachers and students who had been 
much in her home. A chorus of Harvard men and 
another of Wellesley girls furnished the music, sing- 
ing her hymn, “The Tempest,” and others which 
were especially dear to her. Professor Peabody read 
the Scripture and offered prayer; and four college 
presidents — Presidents Angell, Hazard, ‘Tucker, 
and Eliot — made addresses. At the beginning of the 
programme, as at the beginning of this book, was 
placed Mr. Gilder’s exquisite lament; and at the 
end, some lines adapted from Richard Crashaw, a 
poet of whom she had long been fond. 

The addresses on this occasion explore Mrs. 
Palmer’s character with great acuteness, beauty, and 
affection. Each of the four speakers, looking back 





1 Pau 
wets ty 
i 4 hae a 


4 ae 





CHARACTER 329 


on the life, tells what he has seen in it. Perhaps I 
had better do so too. Now that the story of her deeds 
is done, and we can no more watch the development 
of her career, it may be well to summarize the quali- 
ties disclosed. I at least love to linger over her several 
traits no less than to observe how each was glorified 
by its connection with the rest. My reader too will 
be glad to have them passed in review, if that review 
is brief, frank, reverent, and systematic. A kind of 
moral index may appropriately close this book. Suc- 
cessively then I will examine her physical, tempera- 
mental, intellectual, moral, and religious structure. 
She was of medium height, a little below the aver- 
age, and in early life of slender build. At the time 
of her marriage she weighed but a hundred pounds. 
As she afterwards added some forty pounds to this, 
I made it my boast that there was about a third of 
her which I did not marry, but had made. Never 
strong, she was rarely ill, had great power of endur- 
ance, and was seldom shaken by sudden strain. I 
have said that her lungs were her weak part, and 
that from the time she went to college she had a con- 
stant cough. She always took cold easily. There 
may have been also some weakness of the heart, for 
her pulse was so faint that in her best health it was 
difficult to find it. But her step was elastic, her 
bearing erect, her enjoyment of the mere act of living 
incessant. She was sensitive to pain, and her keen 


330 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


perceptions of sight, touch, and taste brought her 
acute pleasure. All ber movements were rapid; 
as, however, she had herself completely under con- 
trol and was quite without nervousness, one received 
from her the impression of calm. When she sat, 
she sat still. A favorite posture was that of listening, 
the body slightly inclined forward and resting on 
the fore part of her chair. 

Her face drew instant attention. When she was 
present it was as difficult to look at anything else as to 
turn the eye away from a flickering fire. One hardly 
asked if the face was beautiful, so immediate was 
the sense of its nobility, its abounding life, and its 
searching personal appeal. Above the large, dark, 
hazel eyes grew luxuriant hair of the same color, 
curling low down over the wide brow and everywhere 
trying to free itself from restraint for play about 
the shapely head. The cheek bones were strongly 
marked, as in Scotch faces; the nose straight and not 
large, the full lips slightly parted. The chin and 
lower face had no particular form, but were moulded 
by herself into endless varieties of expression. Indeed 
the whole face varied so widely that photographs 
taken on the same day might easily be mistaken for 
those of different women. Shifting lights flashed under 
the skin, as in portraits by Leonardo. By printing 
several of her pictures, each in itself unsatisfactory, 
I hope to show something of this baffling diversity. 


CHARACTER 331 


In 1890 Abbott Thayer painted her portrait for 
Wellesley College; and in 1892 Anne Whitney carved 
her bust. The portrait, a young girl dreaming on 
the future of Wellesley, is charmingly idealized, but 
hardly reports her actual features. So mobile a face 
too is peculiarly unsuited to the rigidity of stone or 
bronze. Yet each artist has represented certain 
aspects of her delightfully. A monument interpret- 
ing her work, designed by Daniel Chester French, 
has been placed in Wellesley College Chapel. 

Passing beyond physical aspects and looking more 
closely at the woman herself, we come upon those 
half unconscious dispositions which are conveniently 
grouped together under the name of temperament. 
These represent our emotional habits rather than 
our deliberate purposes. They are largely inherited, 
or the natural result of conduct long gone by; and 
while highly distinctive of each of us, hardly possess 
a moral quality. They are the raw material out of 
which character is formed, and become good or bad 
according to their use. As mere things of nature, 
unsanctioned by will, they are more often associated 
with our weakness than our strength. Yet however 
imperfect they may severally be, and even open one 
by one to disparagement, together they form the 
groundwork of the intellectual and moral life. No 
man is strong or much prized who is not richly 
temperamental. 


332 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Mrs. Palmer’s temperament was an ardent one. 
She entered intensely into all she did. While aston- 
ishingly responsive, and answering with almost equal 
readiness the call of a bird or a human soul, she was 
for the moment absorbed in each. Persons easily 
played upon by things around are likely after a time 
to find all trivial. But for her everything held its 
importance, and even in repetition was fresh. She 
had strong likes and dislikes, though there were 
many more of the former, because under that pene- 
trating eye each thing or person was pretty sure to 
disclose points on which kindly interest might fasten. 
But when she came upon a case of perversity, or 
what at the moment she mistook for this, her indig- 
nation was fierce. Shortly after her death one who 
knew her well remarked to me, on reading a eulogy 
of her, that the writer had missed his mark through 
not mentioning her power of scorn. And I perceived 
that he was right; scorn was an essential factor in 
her. Few illustrated better than this tender and 
sympathetic woman what our Scriptures mean by 
“the wrath of the lamb.”’ There were persons for 
whom she felt a positive aversion. 

Generally, however, like most of those engaged in 
constructive work, she was optimistic, sanguine of 
good in all, whether persons or events. Most things 
have a bright and dark side. Her instinct was for 
brightness. Being resourceful, too, and delighting 


CHARACTER 333 


to push a path through unknown regions, she readily 
discovered in any human situation, however unpro- 
pitious, some means of access to the good she sought. 
The world was her playground. Obstacles, loss, 
stubborn material, slender means, suffering, failure 
even, only quickened her adroitness and brought 
greater enjoyment to the game of life. A hardened 
optimist I have elsewhere called her; and probably 
her spirit of persistent buoyancy is about the richest 
gift which nature ever bestows on a traveller through 
our perplexing world. She knew it to be a means of 
power, prized it, cultivated it, and seldom allowed 
work and play to become dissociated. Humor was 
used unceasingly to oil the machinery of life. No 
occasion was too grave for a good story. I have heard 
of a little girl who on being reproved for laughter 
during prayers queried, “Why, can’t God take a 
joke?” Mrs. Palmer thought He could; and while 
deeply reverent, obliged serious and _ topsy-turvy 
things to live in pretty close intimacy. 

Yet when moods of depression came, as come to 
all they will, she was perfectly frank in expressing 
them. They are openly announced in several of the 
letters which I have printed. Indeed I sometimes 
thought that such moods, like all else in her world, 
furnished a kind of fresh matter for amusement, 
they were let loose with such unnecessary warmth. 
Usually they sprang from fatigue. Of this ignomini- 


334 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


ous root she seemed herself half conscious, aware 
therefore that the abuse plentifully distributed to all 
the world and its inhabitants belonged not so much 
to it as to her own infirmity. But this reflection, if if 
came, in no wise abated either her vehemence or her 
sensible conduct. ‘There were few of those she cared 
for against whom she did not occasionally fulminate; 
and artificial though these denunciations were, and 
little as they affected her devotion to their objects, 
they held close to fact, were incisive, and as enter- 
tainingly exuberant as her more frequent outbursts 
of praise. They were in reality mere explosions, 
temperamental modes of blowing off steam, practised 
often when alone; for she had the habit of talking 
much to herself. But she knew the difference between 
a mood and a judgment, kept each in its place, and 
put the former swiftly by as soon as occasion required. 
If she happened to grow weary of a friend, she would 
drop him for a time — often, I suspect, to his con- 
siderable perplexity; but at any moment of his need 
he would find that all her love was warm and waiting. 
“Life’s a chore,” she would say as she trudged off 
promptly to a disagreeable committee meeting. “I 
want to do something,” was a frequent cry when one 
of these black moods was upon her. “Shall we play 
2 game, or have some reading, or will you lie down 
and rest?” “No, no! I want to do something.” 
And then I must contrive an escapade, the crazier 


CHARACTER 335 


the better, to clear away the fretting deposit of the 
day; after which she would hurry back joyfully to 
work and people, and with all the more eagerness for 
having temporarily put them by. 

It is not necessary to speak further of her extreme 
diligence, which has been illustrated on every page 
of this book. I will merely reiterate two qualifica- 
tions of it; that while skilful in using fragments of 
time, she seldom appeared in haste, nor ever lost the 
ability to be idle. Yet most industrious persons are 
orderly also, and this she was not. She often la- 
mented it pathetically; on her last departure for Eu- 
rope, for example, bidding her sister go to a certain 
closet, in case she did not return, and destroy all its 
contents, because she would lose my respect if I came 
upon such a rubbish heap. For sorting things as she 
used them, and condemning some, her incapacity 
was extreme. But I think the disorderliness was 
chiefly confined to two matters: letters, which have 
always a fragrant personality about them, and which 
before her marriage had been generally cared for 
by her secretary; and then other articles to which 
her tenacious affections clung, articles many and mis- 
cellaneous. She liked to keep things, regardless of 
their use. A flower given by a friend, a pebble picked 
up on a significant occasion, an old school-book, a 
concert programme, a fragment of dress worn at 
some festival, while acknowledged to be much in the 


336 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


way, were exempt from destruction, and gradually 
filled many a drawer and chest. But her business 
habits were models of exactitude, and about her 
rooms and person there could never be anything 
in the least untidy. Of course her writing-table was 
always a complete chaos; and a certain mode of 
increasing that chaos may be mentioned, a pretty 
way she had of dealing with letters which could not 
immediately be answered. She would address an 
envelope to the writer, stamp it, and tossing it on the 
general pile, would appear to win an easy conscience 
for a fairly extended delay. 

Perhaps in closing this sketch of her temperament 
I should mention again its strangely quickening 
quality, its tendency to call forth as by a kind of magic 
the best powers of whomever she came near. By 
identifying herself with those about her she stirred 
their imitative will. But as this occult process has 
been pretty fully described elsewhere, I will here 
merely cite two contrasted instances of it. The first 
is that of a scholar and author, eminent in this 
country and abroad. He writes: “When I last saw 
Mrs. Palmer I was in a hopeless state, caring little 
what I did, especially as regards writing. I never 
mentioned this to her, but with that marvelous in- 
stinct of hers I think she perceived it. At any rate 
she began at once to kindle me, and before I knew 
what was happening I was afire to do a man’s work 


CHARACTER 337 


again. It is adeep regret that the book she prompted, 
the most elaborate and influential I have written, 
her death prevented me from laying in her hands 
and saying, ‘This have I done because you helped 
me to do it by casual words of encouragement.’ ” 

The second letter is from a farmer’s wife: “She 
gave so much of herself to every living thing! To. 
meet her at the Boxford Station in the morning 
made the whole day bright. If she passed me in the 
late afternoon on the long hill, she seemed the fairest 
object in all that stretch of sweet country. I remem- 
ber, too, how beautiful she was at the communion 
table, with the uncovered head, in her summer 
dresses. Even her pictures speak. I cut one from 
the Boston paper that brought the news of her death. 
It is pinned on the wall over my table. I often look 
at it and promise, ‘I will be a better woman, Mrs. 
Palmer, because you have lived.’ And then out of 
the great speaking eyes comes a merry glance that 
shows me she understands.” 

Hitherto we have considered merely the instinc- 
tive sides of her, — her temperament, habits, the 
natural machinery which kept her in motion while 
her intelligence was engaged with other things. But 
that intelligence itself claims attention. It had the 
same swiftness which characterized her throughout, 
conducting her usually at once to the heart of a sub- 
ject and allowing her to waste little time on side 


338 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


issues. Her immediate judgments were sagacious 
judgments. In discussion she caught the point 
quickly, would summarize lucidly an argument she 
had heard or a book she had read, and in dealing 
with all sorts of people perceived by a kind of instinct 
their state of mind and quickly adapted to it what- 
ever she had to say. I have no need to enlarge on 
the versatility of her mind; but will call attention 
once more to the intellectual patience with which she 
pursued distant and large ends, and also to her con- 
stant preference of original and creative work to that 
of mere routine. 

Circumstances in the middle of her life may pos- 
sibly have somewhat changed her mental bias. When 
she went to college she was bent on becoming a 
scholar, and for a time was drawn most strongly 
toward mathematics and Greek, two subjects as 
remote as any from practical affairs. Gradually his- 
tory claimed her, and in it she began studies for the 
doctorate. At this time, I judge, her aim was speciali- 
zation, scientific scholarship. But in this country 
any one who has both scholarly and administrative 
talents is pretty sure to be called on to swamp the 
former in the latter, particularly if he has his own 
bread to earn. From the time she took charge of a 
school the practical side of her nature was upper- 
most. Perhaps it always had been. Though after- 
wards for two years she taught history skilfully at 


CHARACTER 339 


Wellesley, she was even then more occupied with 
guiding girls and organizing a college than with pure 
scholarship. Somebody said of her at this time that 
she was born to rule a nation by a turn of her 
little finger. So it continued through subsequent 
life: the practical reason, and not the theoretic, 
remained her field. It was always the concrete thing, 
the particular individual, the single institution with 
its special problems, which engaged her. In what 
masterly fashion she dealt with them I will not repeat. 
My readers are already sufficiently familiar with her 
sure observation, grasp, constructive power, ingenu- 
ity, fair-mindedness, and estimate of values — all 
qualities implying intellect of a high order. To me 
the distinguishing marks of her mind, in all its forms 
of outgo, are its speed, ease, and sanity. 

Probably all her intellectual powers got Meni 
ness and were prevented from damaging their owner 
by that specialized control of attention which is fre- 
quently seen in successful administrators. As each 
separate person, topic, or situation came forward 
for judgment, she gave it her whole mind; and then, 
after sentence pronounced, from her whole mind alse 
it disappeared. Such minds work in closed com- 
partments and admit few straggling thoughts. At 
times of business she did not look much before or 
after, but straight into. ‘This concentration I regard 
as one of the surest indications of intellectual force- 


340 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


In testing practical power we may well ask how long 
can a person hold the attention firmly and freshly on 
2 single subject, and then how fully can he give it its 
discharge? In my narrative this ability to switch 
on and switch off has been amply illustrated. 

Her moral nature was grounded in sympathy. 
Beginning early, the identification of herself with 
others grew into a constant habit, of unusual range 
and delicacy. I have shown how in her childhood 
each member of the family was called on to con- 
tribute whatever he had to the common stock, how 
each felt himself responsible for all, and separate 
interests were unknown. ‘This enforced public sense, 
behind which she did not at that time go, became in 
later years a conscious principle guiding her life, 
and one which she longed to see guiding the lives of 
all. To get anything at the cost of another was 
impossible for her; to keep anything which another 
might need, painful. She suffered with those whom 
she saw suffer. Righteousness is, after all, merely 
the daily love of man —of man in his divinity, 
weakness, aspirations, errors, interests, and idiosyn- 
cracies. This Jesus announced, St. Francis preached, 
and all great moralists have urged. To it Mrs. 
Palmer had habituated herself until it imparted ele- 
vation and sweetness to her commonest acts. Its 
working will most easily be seen in a few trivial in- 
stances. 


CHARACTER 341 


A poor woman of Boxford tells me that she was 
leaning over her gate one evening, watching for her 
husband’s return, when Mrs. Palmer passed by. 
As usual, she stopped to talk. Incidentally she 
learned that the good wife’s soup for. supper was 
waiting to be made till the farmer should bring a 
couple of turnips from the village. Mrs. Palmer 
walked on, but soon appeared again, turnips in hand. 
The soup could be started. 

One summer a young bride came to Boxford. In 
calling on her, Mrs. Palmer wanted to hear every 
detail of the wedding and to see the beautiful clothes. 
‘Into the enjoyment of these fineries she entered 
with unbounded zest, but said at the close, “ Don’t 
wear them too often here. Plain dressing is best for 
the country; and clothes that put a distance between 
-you and other people are not nice.’ With such fra- 
grant trifles her daily ways were strewn. 

Being so sympathetic, she naturally enjoyed every- 
body and condescended to none. Whether she min- 
gled with scholars and business men, with children 
and society women, with lawyers, school-girls, coun- 
try folk, or criminals, she took them just as they 
stood, found them all vividly interesting, and they 
found her not less so. When in close contact with 
wrongdoers, I think she seldom censured them, even 
in her own mind, but felt the naturalness of their 
case, the pity of it, the wealth of life they were losing, 


= 


342 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


and the longing — soon felt by them too —for 
bridges of return. In one of his parables Jesus 
warns his disciples against plucking up tares in fields 
of grain. ‘The roots of the two are so intertwined, he 
thinks, that a hasty pull at the poorer may easily 
damage the better. Apparently some such view 
made her tolerant of evil. To its eradication she gave 
little heed, preferring rather to fertilize the good 
until it should be strong enough to crowd out inferior 
growths. 

Most persons will agree that sympathy is the 
predominantly feminine virtue, and that she who 
lacks it cannot make its absence good by any col- 
lection of other worthy qualities. In a true woman 
sympathy directs all else. To find a virtue equally 
central in a man we must turn to truthfulness or 
courage. ‘These also a woman should possess, as a 
man too should be sympathetic; but in her they take 
a subordinate place, subservient to omnipresent 
svmpathy. Within these limits the ampler they are, 
the nobler the woman. 

I believe Mrs. Palmer had a full share of both these 
manly excellences, and practised them in thoroughly 
feminine fashion. She was essentially true, hating 
humbug in all its disguises. Being a keen observer, 
she knew a fact when she saw it and did not juggle 
with herself by calling things what they are not. 
Her love of plainness and distaste for affectation 


CHARACTER 843 


were forms of veracity. But in a narrative of hers 
one got much besides plain realities. ‘These had their 
significance heightened by her eager emotion, and 
their picturesqueness by her happy artistry. In 
merry moods her fantastic exaggerations were 
delightful. Of course the warmth of her sympathy 
cut off all inclination to falsehood for its usual selfish 
purpose. But against generous untruth she was not 
so well guarded. Kindness was the first thing. In) 
dealing with a trembling soul, if the bluntness of 
reality would hurt, its edges were smoothed. Tact 
too, once become a habit, made adaptation to the 
mind addressed a constant concern. She had ex- 
traordinary skill in stuffing kindness with truth; and 
into a resisting mind could without irritation convey 
a larger bulk of unwelcome fact than any one I have 
known. But that insistence on colorless statement 
which in our time the needs of trade and science 
have made current among men, she did not feel. 
Lapses from exactitude which do not separate person 
from person she easily condoned. 

Her courage was remarkable. President Eliot has 
selected this trait for special eulogy: “One of the 
most fascinating attributes of Mrs. Palmer was her 
courage. She was one of the bravest persons I ever 
saw, man or woman. Courage is a pleasing attribute . 
in a tough, powerful, healthy man; it 1s perfectly 
delightful in a delicate, tender woman.” But this 


344 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


courage, extreme though it was, was also chiefly an 
expression of social loyalty, victorious over personal 
feeling. ‘There was in it little of that blind push 
which knows no danger; she had her feminine fears. 
A cow, a mouse, a snake were objects of terror. 
I seldom went to walk in Paris that she did not warn 
me of the perils of street-crossings. She was sensitive 
to the judgments of others, and shrank from having 
anything in her dress, speech, or behavior remarked 
as “queer.” To be conspicuous was disagreeable. 
But such timidities were altogether set aside the. 
moment aid could be given. In the public interest 
or in helping those she loved she never faltered. No 
difficulty, risk, or misconception stopped her serene 
advance. Her mind appeared to gain additional 
clearness and resolve in times of danger, and the 
dependence of persons on her to be a chief source of 
strength. Kant declares that in the voice of duty 
we hear the assurance, “You can, because you 
ought.”” Mrs. Palmer believed this fully. Wherever 
there was human need she turned without measuring" 
powers or preferences. ‘The time of her sister’s death, 
her presidency at Wellesley, the busy years of Cam- 
bridge were crowded with cases of such easy hardi- 
hood. ‘Two little instances from private life will. 
show how exquisitely love could embolden her. 

In 1896 I was ordered to undergo a serious surgical 
operation. On leaving home for the Boston hospital 


CHARACTER 345 


I charged Mrs. Palmer not to visit me till the fol- 
lowing noon, when the operation would be over. 
But she timed her coming so as to arrive while I was 
still in the surgeon’s hands. She wanted an: oppor- 
tunity quietly to inspect my room. About it she 
arranged pleasant articles from our home, and then 
discovered that my pillow was not what she ap- 
proved. Hurrying back to Cambridge, she seized 
the long pillow from my bed, crossed Boston with 
it in her arms — the four miles requiring a change 
_ of electric cars and a considerable walk — reached 
my room before I was brought in, and when I awoke 
she was sitting by my head, which rested on the sacred 
pillow. Subsequently I asked if she had not found 
it disagreeable to expose herself on streets and in 
public conveyances with so unusual a burden; but 
she seemed hardly to comprehend my question. She 
had been thinking of my comfort and had not no- 
ticed smiling observers. 

A few years later she herself was in a low state, 
and I could get no exact account of what the matter 
was. One Sunday, as I knelt beside her in the Box- 
ford church, I saw a tear drop to the floor. Gaily, 
however, she went off to Boston on Monday, saying 
her doctor had promised full details of the case that 
day. ‘Toward evening I received a note announcing 
that she was to be operated upon on the following 
‘Morning. Knowing that I was pledged to a difficult 


846 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


piece of writing, she had kept her trouble to herself 
so long as concealment was possible. 

Between a life which so embodies those of its fel- 
lows and a life of religion there is little difference; 
but there is a little, and hers was a specifically 
religious nature. In every call of human need she 
heard the voice of God, summoning her to free his 
children from selfishness and woe. The love of God, 
it has been well said, is devotion to duty intensified 
it) intellectual clearness and in emotional strength 
by the conviction that its aim is also that of a great 
personality. This courage-bringing conviction she 
had. All her morality was therefore touched with a 
divine emotion. Her aims were unified. In solitude 
and suffering she was not alone. She knew that the 
stars in their courses shone on her designs, and ac- 
cessible love throbbed through all things. 

In my third chapter I have explained how this 
clear consciousness of personal friendship with the 
Ruler of all began in the perplexing exaltations of 
the Windsor period. ‘The larger love was revealed 
through the limitations of the smaller. But the con- 
secration then made was no temporary affair. It 
bore the strains of more than thirty years, being 
renewed in the Sunday schools of Ann Arbor, at 
her sister’s bedside, by spiritual ministrations at 
Wellesley, and in the busy peace of the Cambridge 
home. But hers was a free soul. Into her religion 


CHARACTER — 347 


no dread entered. She rejoiced in the Lord and in 
the power of his might. And just as her intercourse 
with her fellow men was directed by sympathy for 
their needs and interests, so did a kind of sympathy 
' with God shape her devotion. He was her steady 
companion, so naturally a part of her hourly thought 
that she attached little consequence to specific occa- 
sions of intercourse. While she entered heartily into 
church services, even when of a pretty rude order, her © 
Sundays hardly differed from other days. She had no 
fixed times of prayer or devout reading, and in gen- 
eral attached little importance to pious proprieties. 

Prizing too spiritual diversity and bold with divine 
affections, she welcomed every species of earnest 
seeking after God. With all sorts of believers and 
unbelievers she associated with equal freedom, and 
felt God stirring in them all. Only two religious — 
animosities did I ever detect in her. She was uncom- 
fortable with those who make of religion a thing 
apart, an affair of performance and ritual; and again 
with the negationists and minimizers, those who 
seek to reduce religion to its lowest terms, question- 
ing its poetry and timid over a creed. Her own creed 
was clear and strong, being that of the orthodox 
faith. In ideal manhood she saw the complete revela- 
tion of God. Reverently therefore she turned to Jesus 
of Nazareth and sought to make her life, like his, 
both human and divine. 


348 ALICE FREEMAN PALMER 


Such was the woman of whom these pages treat — 
such, but oh how different! I am painfully conscious 
of my inability to revitalize so abounding a being. 
The life-blood is gone. A person once dead can 
hardly be made to walk again, certainly not by 
analytic me. In order to be less inadequate I have 
added to the earlier chapters, where she was moving 
through affairs, this summary of her more important 
traits. Yet such a precise and abstract statement 
belittles anew. The qualities we admired in her, 
taken singly, were fortunately not rare. Others pos- 
sess them, possess them often in higher degree. 
Only their combination was remarkable. In her 
single person she harmonized what is commonly 
conflicting ; so that while she conveyed rather unusu- 
ally the impression of being made all in one piece, 
he who set out to describe her found himself obliged 
to contradict in each new sentence whatever he had | 
asserted of her in his old. Such was her wealthy. 
unity, the despair of him who would portray. Per- 
haps this is merely to say that she was very much of. 
a woman. At any rate, so it was: so simple, yet so 
elusive was her blended nature. 

And because of its combined variety and firmness” 
that nature contained some provision for all; nor was 
it ever closed to any. She seemed built for bounty, 
and held nothing back. Gaily she went forth through- 
out her too few years, scattering happiness up and 


CHARACTER 349 


down neglected ways. A fainting multitude flocked 
around to share her wisdom, peace, hardihood, de- 
voutness, and merriment; and more easily after- 
wards accommodated themselves to their lot. Strength 
continually went forth from her. She put on right- 
eousness and it clothed her, and sound judgment was 
her daily crown. Each eye that saw her blessed her; 
each ear that heard her was made glad. 


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Hark hither, reader, will’t thou see 
Nature her own physician be. 

Will’t see a soul all her own wealth, 

Her own music, her own health; 

A soul whose sober thought can tell 

How to wear her garments well, 

Her garments that upon her sit 

(As garments should do) close and fit; 

A well-cloth’d soul, that’s not opprest 
Nor chokt with what she should be drest, 
But sheathéd in a crystal shrine, 
Through which all her bright features shine; 
A soul whose intellectual beams 

No mists do mask, no lazy steams; 

A happy soul, that all the way 

To heaven hath a summer’s day; 

Whose latest and most leaden hours 

Fall with soft wings, please with gay flowers; 
And when life’s sweet fable ends 

This soul and body part like friends; 

No quarrels, murmurs, no delay; 

A kiss, a sigh, and so away. 


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DATES 


1855, February 21. Born at Colesville, New York. 

1862-64. Father at Albany Medical School. 

1864, Family moves to Windsor. 

1865, Windsor Academy. 

1872, Michigan University. 

1875. Ottawa High School. 

1876. B. A. Michigan. Geneva Lake Seminary. 

1877-79, Saginaw High School. 

1878. Family moves to Saginaw. Called to Wellesley. 

1879. Stella Freeman dies. Professor of History at Welles- 
ley. 

1880. Severe illness. 

1881. Mr. Durant dies. Acting President of Wellesley 
College. 

1882, President of Wellesley and Ph.D. Michigan. Col- 
legiate Alumnz Association. 

1884. In England. 

1885. Norumbega Cottage. 

1887, Litt. D. Columbia. Marries and moves to Cam- 
bridge. 

1888. ‘Trustee of Wellesley College. 

1888-89. In Europe. 

1889, Woman’s Home Missionary Society. Massachusetts 
State Board of Education. 


854 DATES 


1891. Woman’s Education Association. 

1891. Board of Managers of World’s Fair. Portrait 
painted. 

1892. Bust carved. University of Chicago. 

1894. Quincy Street, Cambridge. Endowment for Rad- 
cliffe College. 

1895-96. In Europe. 

1898. Bicycle Accident. 

1900. International Institute for Girls in Spain. Bradford 
Academy. 

1902. Death. 


1920. November 10. Elected to the Hall of Fame. 


APPENDIX 


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APPENDIX 


I 
THE STORY OF THE SLUM GIRL 


Few parts of this book have stirred so deep an interest as 
pages 306-10, a portion not written by me. The story 
there so skillfully related has had a strange and romantic 
sequel. I celebrate the coming of my book to its fiftieth 
thousand by reporting here the almost incredible tale. 
Several years after the publication of my book, I ad- 
dressed a Harvard Club in a Western city. As we gathered 
around the fire afterwards a gentleman approached, and, 
greeting me heartily, said he had always been grateful for a 
course on Philosophy he had had with me. I asked what he 
had been doing since graduation. He said he had gone 
through the Law School, married early, and soon brought 
his wife to the West. They had often talked of me, and she 
wanted him to bring me to see her the following morning. 
I said I always liked to inspect the girls my boys married 
and to judge if it were wisely done; but in this case I must 
take the happiness on faith, as I was obliged to catch the 
early morning train. “ But,” he urged, “my wife charged 
me to accept no excuse. She has something of importance to 
tell you and will be much disappointed if she cannot do so.” 
“Then,” I answered, “‘since I am not to get her message 
from herself, perhaps you will give it to me now.” “I can- 
not do so,” he said. ‘Before leaving home I promised I 
would not.”’ A little annoyed at his persistence, I closed the 
talk with, “Very well. I cannot ask the friends with whom 


358 APPENDIX 


I am staying to give me an early breakfast. But if you will 
bring an automobile to my house three quarters of an hour 
before my train starts, I may be able to stop at your door on 
my way to the station.” 

Promptly the next morning when breakfast was hardly 
begun, he appeared. I excused myself from the table and 
was driven to a quarter of the town where houses were 
small. Before one of the neatest of these we stopped. As I 
ran up the front steps, the door was opened by an attractive 
voung woman, plainly but tastefully dressed, who took me 
to a room where a child about a year old was playing on the 
floor. “This is my little Alice,” she said. ‘You remember 
your account of the slum girl in Cambridge to whom Mrs. 
Palmer was kind? I am that girl.” “But how did you 
come here, and so changed?”’ I asked. Then followed her 
marvelous story. I will not attempt to recall its rapid words, 
but will piece together what I heard, what her husband 
told me, and what I subsequently gathered from her letters. 

She did not know the date or place of her birth or who 
were her parents. Her earliest remembrance was of misery 
in the slums of East Cambridge, where she had charge of 
the children of a drunken unmarried pair. Several hours a 
day, too, must be spent in picking over the ash heap behind 
the house, thrown out by a neighboring factory. She had no 
schooling, nor a whole pair of shoes, and only rags for 
clothing. The man when sober got an occasional job, but 
food was scanty, and only scoldings and beatings were 
plentiful. Her back still bore the marks of bruises received 
by being thrown downstairs. Straying from such a home 
one summer morning, the open door of a vacation school 
brought her face to face with Mrs. Palmer and to the events 
described by Miss Fielder. 

Who Mrs. Palmer was she did not know, not even her 


APPENDIX 359 


name. For years she thought of her merely as “My Beauti- 
ful Lady,” an object for worship. But Mrs. Palmer, with 
that curious instinct for detecting merit, whether covered 
with rags or silk, followed her up. Every week or two she 
met her by appointment on the open marsh and had a 
half-hour’s talk with her. Blessed seasons these, when the 
child learned the Lord’s Prayer, to be repeated each night, 
learned to be interested in the children hitherto a burden, 
learned the beauty of flowers, clouds, and gentle speech. A 
new world was opening to her. And one day her Beautiful 
Lady took her to her own house, stood her on the kitchen 
table, and put on her a white dress which she had made her- 
self. Proudly she walked home, dressed in this splendor. 
But the man there pulled it off, sold it for liquor, and 
threatened to kill her if she ever spoke to that lady again. 
Once more, however, she did meet her, at the next week’s 
appointment. Then her Lady said the meetings had better 
end. The child had learned how to be a good girl, and God 
would protect her as she grew. She never saw her Beautiful 
Lady again. 

How long a time now passed she could not tell, weeks and 
years went by uncounted in that squalid misery. A single 
incident, however, stood out. A Baptist minister one day 
spoke kindly to her and led her to confide in him her secret. 
“There is nothing in the world I love as I do my Beautiful 
Lady. Sometimes I am afraid I love her too much.” “You 
needn’t fear,” he answered. “Of course you wouldn’t love 
her as you love God. But in anything short of that there is 
no danger.” She went out behind the church, looked up to 
the sky, and cried, ““O God, [love my Beautiful Lady more 
than I do you.” But no bolt fell. 

An indefinite time passed, and the home became too 
brutal to bear. She ran away and entered a factory in Old 


360 APPENDIX 


Cambridge. She tried to give her evenings to study. Once 
the girls at her table invited a few law students to an even- 
ing’s entertainment. They were the first intellectual young 
men whom she had ever met, and one of them attracted her 
strongly. She told him of her attempts at study and how 
difficult she found them. What books did she need, and 
how should she use them? He offered to bring her books, 
adding that he would look in every week or two and see how 
she was coming on. The weeks grew productive and happy. 
Before many had passed, the two became engaged. He 
was about as poor as she. But as it cost no more to live to- 
gether than apart, they soon married. Then she shared his 
studies. Each evening he went over his law lectures with 
her and by explaining them to her mastered them better 
himself. He told her how he had been impelled to study by 
a certain Professor of Philosophy. She declared that all 
that was of worth in her came from her Beautiful Lady. As 
their first Christmas approached, he brought her a book 
which he heard I had lately written. She opened it, saw 
Mrs. Palmer’s face, read of her own childhood, and learned 
for the first time who had been her guardian angel. Mrs. 
Palmer had then been dead many years. How long before 
her death the incidents related by Miss Fielder occurred I 
have been unable to trace. Characteristically Mrs. Palmer 
never mentioned them to me nor to her sister. A newspaper 
in Birmingham, England, first gave me the account. I cut 
it out and inserted it in my Biography without changing a 
word. Perhaps I should have remained ignorant of this 
beautiful sequel if I had not, somewhat unwillingly, ad- 
dressed that Harvard Club. Twice since then I have met 
the radiant pair and their children. No one would guess 
the early hardships and privations of the wife. She is a cul- 
tivated lady, equal, her husband proudly tells me, to him- 


APPENDIX 361 


self in acquaintance with law. The amazing story deserves 
a place in my narrative as showing how any undertaking of 
Mrs. Palmer’s, however incidental or hindered by adverse 
circumstances, usually moved naturally on to success. Her 
sympathetic words were apt to awaken a response and to 
prosper in the thing whereto she sent them. 


II 
THE HALL OF FAME 


In November, 1920, Mrs. Palmer was elected to the Hall of 
Fame. Elections are held only once in five years, and no 
one is eligible for membership till ten years after death. As 
she died in 1902, the earliest possible date when she might 
have been chosen was 1915, in which year she received 
forty-seven votes, forty-nine being at that time necessary 
for election. In 1920, fifty-three votes were cast for her. 
She was the only woman chosen in company with six men, 
and is, with the exception of E. A. Poe, the youngest person 
admitted to membership. 

The plan of this Westminster Abbey of the West is that, 
during the single century 1900-2000 a.p., there shall be set 
up in a long corridor on University Heights, overlooking 
the Hudson, tablets in memory of one hundred and fifty 
Great Americans, grouped in fifteen classes according to 
their occupations during life. They are drawn from every 
period of our history, with careful guard against favoritism. 
A jury of a hundred persons selects them, itself appointed 
by the Senate of New York University. This is the only 
authority exercised by that university, though the corridor 
containing the tablets is in its charge and is immediately 
connected with its library. The electors are all persons of 
standing belonging to one or other of the following classes: 
Presidents of colleges, professors of history, scientists, 
authors, judges of the higher courts. It is this wise precau- 
tion against cheap judgment, political influence, and sudden 
waves of popular favor which has made the list of names 


APPENDIX 363 


a veritable Roll of Honor, likely to be permanently ap- 
proved. 

Each of the sixty-six men and seven women thus far 
chosen has contributed something to the well-being of the 
country. Their contributions have naturally been of 
many kinds. When one asks why has Mrs. Palmer, for 
example, been assigned a place with Jonathan Edwards, 
Alexander Hamilton, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Phillips 
Brooks, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Augustus Saint- 
Gaudens, one can only answer that through her work in 
education she made herself widely loved. In her winning 
personality was seen a valued ideal of American woman- 
hood. 

A fund was originally given the university to cover the 
cost of the bronze tablets bearing the notable’s name, the 
dates of his birth and death, and a sentence of his writing. 
Subsequently an appeal was made for busts to be set up by 
private gift; and on May 13, 1924, ten such busts were in- 
stalled, in addition to eight already there. All are of 
bronze, of a prescribed size and height. Wellesley College 
presented a bust of Mrs. Palmer, the work of Evelyn 
Longman, the unveiling address being by President 
James R. Angell, of Yale University. A replica of the bust 
is at Wellesley. 


Date Due 

















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